Every day, we see the domination and monopoly that lots of companies have in their respective markets. Today, I’d like to focus on an article regarding the boycott of Indian traders from Coca-Cola.

As we all know, Coca-Cola is the main distributor of fizzy drinks, but people never really take time to think of how these drinks are produced and all the resources required to put out such large quantities into the market. These drinks heavily rely on sugarcane, which is grown in large amounts in India, especially the state of Tamil Nadu. The director of NGO India Resource Center, Amit Srivastava, states that “a small bottle of Coca-Cola requires around 1.9 liters of water, and if you take into account the water needed for the sugarcane plants, then it would be around 400 liters of water for a small bottle of Coca-Cola.”

Now how does this relate to business ethics?

First off, what are business ethics? They’re the moral and ethical behaviors, policies, and practices of companies regarding potentially controversial problems.

In this case, Coca-Cola is showing poor business ethics. For the benefits of their company, they are using very high volumes of water in India in order to tend to the sugarcane, which contributes to the flavoring of their drinks. As per the article, if sugarcane plants and the rest of the procedure are accounted for, then it takes around 400 liters of water to successfully form a small bottle of Coca-Cola. Why the company is demonstrating poor ethics is because they are showing absolutely no consideration for the people in the state of Tamil Nadu. The state is already in a drought, and yet Coca-Cola continues to strain water resources from the state in order to produce their beverages. Their failure to realize the negative effect on the rest of the society in India is what is resulting in the boycotting of Indian traders.

I think any business should have business ethics. If a company has no ethics in what they do, they will be doing harm to the general public and their consumers despite making as much profit as they can. What good is there if a company maximizes profit by throwing ethics out the window while have a very negative reputation in the public eye?

The success of businesses is not just all about the money. It is also very important to consider how the money is earned and how having social responsibilities as a company can benefit the general public.

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https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/mar/01/indian-traders-boycott-coca-cola-for-straining-water-resources