NLPC is sponsoring two shareholder proposals that seek truthful scientific and economic analysis in plastic packaging policies for this spring’s season of corporate annual meetings — one each at Colgate-Palmolive and Walmart. Left-leaning activists who in the past have backed proposals that mostly address companies’ greenhouse gas emissions under climate alarmism theories seem to have shifted tactics, with an increasing number of resolutions focusing on “reducing waste” in plastics packaging. Both strategies are attacks on the hydrocarbons industry.
NLPC presented its proposal at Colgate-Palmolive last week, and Walmart’s annual meeting is scheduled for June 5. Yesterday industry publication Plastics News, a product of Crain’s, published a lengthy story about our proposals. The article is behind a pay wall, but a few excerpts follow:
The National Legal and Policy Center, which filed other shareholder resolutions this year pushing companies to drop diversity, equity and inclusion polices, is now wading into plastics, saying said it wants Colgate and Walmart to rethink packaging policies it calls “fake environmentalism.”
It’s become common in recent years for environmental activist investment groups to file shareholder resolutions asking companies to cut back on single-use plastics, but this is the first time that NLPC has filed resolutions questioning companies about plastics, said Paul Chesser, director of corporate accountability at Falls Church, Va.-based NLPC.
“All we are asking is for stronger and more objective scientific and economic analysis of the issue rather than the companies capitulating to the demands of pressure groups operating under the flimsy cover of their biased ‘plastics pollution’ reports,” said Chesser. “If they are spending millions (if not billions) of dollars more for product manufacturing or packaging that is more virtue-signaling than environmental protection, at the expense of maximizing returns, then that is not good business management.” ….
At the Colgate meeting, Chesser questioned company claims about the recyclability of its 100 percent high density polyethylene toothpaste tubes, launched with much fanfare in 2019, as well as arguing that using recycled plastics in some products costs the company money without providing environmental benefits.
“Colgate pays significantly more for feel-good measures that accomplish no benefit for the environment,” he said. “The company must undertake serious scientific and economic analysis of its plastics policies instead of following a fact-free activist driven agenda.”
NLPC circulated a 14-page solicitation memo to other Colgate-Palmolive investors ahead of the meeting, which further explained the rationale for its call for stronger scientific and economic analysis in plastics packaging policies. It is posted under the Company’s docket at the Securities and Exchange Commission.
You can view NLPC’s proposal for Colgate-Palmolive here and for Walmart here.
