야자유, 그리고 유니레버…

위키백과 읽다 보니 유니레버라는 회사의 재미있는 사실을 발견;
마가린 만들던 네덜란드 회사(Unie)와 비누 만들던 영국회사(Lever)가 합병해서 만든 회사인데…. 무엇보다도 눈길을 끄는건 그 역사의 이면에 놓여있는 숨겨진 중요한 요소 - 야자유(Palm Oil)이다.

글로벌 기업(자본)이라는게 어느날 갑자기 짜잔~하고 근사하게 만들어 진게 아니라, 그 역사의 이면과 배경에는 (식민지) 강제노동, 노동자/농민의 피와 땀, 눈물이 "자본"의 ‘씨앗’이었다는 것.


UNILEVER = “Naamlooze Vennootschap Margarine Unie" of the Netherlands and "Lever Brothers Limited" of the UK.

The amalgamation of the operations of British soapmaker Lever Brothers and Dutch margarine producer Margarine Unie made sound commercial sense, as palm oil was a major raw material for both margarines and soaps…

The initial harvesting of palm oil was from British West Africa, from where news reports seen back in England showed the workers abroad in favourable conditions. In 1911 the company received a concession for 750,000 hectares of forest in Belgian Congo, mostly south of Bandundu, where a system of forced labour operated. The subsidiary of Lever was named “Huileries du Congo Belge".

During the great depression in the thirties, the Huileries sharply decreased the fee for gathered oil nuts, while the government of Belgian Congo strongly increased taxation. This resulted in social unrest in 1931, which are known as the Revolution of the Pende, in which eventually more than 400 members of the Pende-tribe were killed…

[Source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unilever ]