Coca-Cola

Coca-Cola is an American beverage corporation that operates through a network of franchises and subsidiaries and is a target for global boycotts for its role in operating in illegal Israeli settlements. The company is accused of directly violating international law through settlement operations, fueling armed conflicts through its supply chains, and violently suppressing labor organizing. In December 2024, the Palestinian BDS National Committee added Coca-Cola to its priority boycott list, citing the company’s Central Bottling Company operations in the illegal Atarot settlement.

Israeli settlement operations and military complicity

Central Bottling Company (Coca-Cola Israel), Coca-Cola's exclusive Israeli franchise since 1967, operates a major distribution facility in the Atarot Industrial Zone, an illegal Israeli settlement built on 378 acres of stolen Palestinian land . Central Bottling Company controls 40% of the Israeli beverage market and pays corporate taxes directly funding the Israeli Apartheid government.

During the October 2023 Gaza genocide, Israeli soldiers were repeatedly photographed with Coca-Cola products donated by pro-Israel groups.

Tabor Winery subsidiary

Tabor Winery is an Israeli winery owned by The Central Bottling Company (Coca-Cola Israel), the winery produces wines from grapes sourced from occupied land in settlements in the West Bank and Syrian Golan.

Labor violence and union suppression

Coca-Cola operates through a complex global network of bottlers, distributors, and franchisees across nearly 200 countries, making comprehensive oversight of labor practices challenging. The company delegates manufacturing and distribution to local partners like Femsa in Latin America, creating layers of corporate structure that can obscure accountability. This franchise model allows Coca-Cola to distance itself from direct responsibility for labor violations while maintaining operational control through licensing agreements, supply chain management, and board representation.

The following cases represent documented instances of labor rights violations within Coca-Cola's global operations, though the company's extensive network means many similar incidents likely remain unreported or unaddressed.

Colombia operations

The UN Human Right Consul released a statement in 2014, in which CETIM states that Coca-Cola's operations in Colombia through its franchise system enable systematic attacks on labor and trade union rights. The company has been linked to the deaths of at least ten trade union members, including a trade union leader who was killed inside company premises on December 5, 1996, the day negotiations were set to begin on union demands. Coca-Cola has used paramilitary connections, criminalization campaigns against union members, and mass layoffs to suppress Sinaltrainal union activities. The company operates through subcontracting arrangements covering 70% of its 7,000 workers to avoid collective bargaining obligations, while simultaneously pursuing legal action to declare union sections illegal across multiple Colombian cities.

Brazil modern slave labor

Brazilian labor inspections between 2015-2016 found Coca-Cola bottler Spal Indústria Brasileira de Bebidas, part of the Mexican Femsa group, subjecting 179 truck drivers and delivery assistants to exhaustive working conditions that constituted modern slavery according to the Brazilian Ministry of Labor auditors. Workers averaged at least 80 overtime hours per month, with extreme cases reaching 140 overtime hours monthly - equivalent to daily shifts averaging over 14 hours.

Environmental destruction and water colonialism

India - Plachimada

The Plachimada bottling plant in Kerala, operated by Coca-Cola's Indian subsidiary Hindustan, caused severe environmental damage to indigenous communities through excessive groundwater extraction and toxic waste dumping. The plant extracted 500,00-2 million liters of water daily, causing local wells to run dry and contaminating remaining water sources, which turned milky white and brackish within six months of operations. Coca-Cola distributed toxic sludge containing heavy metals like cadmium at concentrations 400-600% above permissible limits to unsuspecting farmers as "fertilizer," affecting over 1,000 families.

The factory was later closed in 2005, predominantly due to grassroots resistance by the adivasi communities.

Mexico - San Cristóbal de las Casas

Coca-Cola's operations in San Cristóbal de las Casas, Chiapas, through its Femsa bottling plant, extract over 300,000 gallons of water daily from the Huitepec volcano basin under decades-old permits costing only about 10 cents per 260 gallons, while local residents face severe water shortages with some neighborhoods receiving running water only three hours every two days.

The plant requires 35 liters of water to produce each half-liter bottle of Coca-Cola, contributing to a water crisis where over one-third of rural Chiapas residents lack access to running water despite the state having Mexico's highest per capita water resources. This water scarcity forces residents to purchase expensive bottled water or consume Coca-Cola instead.

The situation has led to Chiapas having Mexico's highest soda consumption at 683.8 liters per person annually, while groundwater contamination from sewage pollution makes tap water unsafe to drink, forcing dependence on corporate bottled products and contributing to a diabetes epidemic that increased mortality rates by 30 percent between 2013 and 2016.

Plastic pollution

Coca-Cola has been ranked the world’s top plastic polluter for five consecutive years, according to Break Free From Plastic’s global brand audit reports from 2018–2022. In 2022, more than 31,000 Coca-Cola branded plastic items were collected during worldwide cleanup drives, exceeding the combined total of the next two top polluters In 2023, Coca-Cola again topped the list, recording the highest number of plastic waste items ever during a global community-led audit spanning 250 cleanups across 41 countries

Sudan conflict financing through gum arabic

Gum arabic serves as an essential emulsifier in Coca-Cola with no viable substitutes, making Sudan's 70%-80% global production critical to operations. The RSF (Rapid Support Forces) controls key production regions of Kordofan and Darfur, with UN Security Council reports documenting $14.6 million worth of gum arabic looted by RSF forces between January-June 2024.

Companies pay the RSF $2,500 per truck for transport permits through controlled territories. An estimated 50,000-70,000 tonnes were smuggled into Chad in 2024. WhatsApp messages reviewed by Reuters show traders offering Sudanese gum arabic at $1,950/tonne versus the normal $3,000/tonne, indicating stolen or conflict-sourced material.

Coca-Cola has declined to comment on multiple Reuters and Bloomberg investigations documenting supply chain connections to conflict financing. The conflict has displaced over 11 million people and created the world's largest hunger crisis, with 5 million Sudanese depending on gum arabic production for income.

Pattern of corporate complicity

During Nazi Germany, Coca-Cola's German operations grew over 1566.67% by 1933. The brand Fanta was invented at this time for Nazi Germany, due to restrictions on getting the Cola formula during the war.

Coca-Cola funded the Global Energy Balance Network with $1.5 million to promote the message that exercise, not diet reduction, is the primary solution to obesity, despite scientific evidence showing exercise has minimal impact on weight loss compared to caloric intake. The company provided nearly $4 million since 2008 to prominent scientists who advanced arguments downplaying the role of sugary drinks in obesity epidemics, with industry-funded studies being five times more likely to find no link between sugary drinks and weight gain compared to independent research.

Sources:

• Aljazeera Forgotten
• Atlas Obscura How Fanta Was Created for Nazi Germany
• Business and Human Rights Centre Sudan: Coca-Cola, M&M’s, Mars & L’Oreal among brands at risk of fueling conflict through gum arabic trade
• BDS Movement Coca-Cola: Quenching Israel's genocidal soldiers' thirst
• Bloomberg A Genocidal Militia in Sudan Controls a Key Ingredient in Coke and Pepsi
• Break Free From Plastic 2023 Global Brand Audit: The Coca-Cola Company is once again the top global plastic polluter
• Break Free From Plastic The Coca-Cola Company and PepsiCo named top plastic polluters for the fourth year in a row
• Break Free From Plastic COP27 Sponsor The Coca-Cola Company named worst plastic polluter for five years in a row according to 2022 Brand Audit
• CETIM Human Rights Violations by Coca Cola in Colombia
• CNBC Coca-Cola Funds Scientists Who Shift Blame for Obesity Away From Bad Diets
• Institute for Palestinian Studies The Atarot Exception? Business and Human Rights under Colonization
• i24News Israel: The monopoly nation
• Killer Coke Stop Killer Coke!
• Killer Coke Reports | Nazi Germany and Coca-Cola: An Unholy Alliance
• Middle East Eye Key Coca-Cola and Pepsi ingredient 'controlled by RSF paramilitary in Sudan'
• Middle East Eye Looted gum arabic and gold fuelling RSF in Sudan's civil war, says UN report
• Middle East Eye Looted gum arabic and gold fuelling RSF in Sudan's civil war, says UN report
• Repórter Brasil Ministério do Trabalho responsabiliza fabricante da Coca-Cola por trabalho escravo
• Repórter Brasil Via Veneto, fabricante da Coca-Cola e outros 48 nomes entram na ‘lista suja’ do trabalho escravo
• Reuters How a key ingredient in Coca-Cola, M&M's is smuggled from war-torn Sudan
• Ritimo The Plachimada Struggle against Coca Cola in Southern India
• Plastic Pollution Coalition Earth Island Institute Files Lawsuit Against Coca-Cola for False Advertising
• The Coca-Cola Company The Coca-Cola System
• The Guardian Coca-Cola boycott launched after killings at Colombian plants
• The Israeli Times Over 100,000 soldiers to receive Bamba and Coke Thursday
• The New Arab Coca-Cola, M&M's ingredient smuggled from RSF controlled Sudan
• Who Profits The Central Bottling Company (Coca Cola Israel)
• Who Profits Tabor Winery