Eco-Friendly Activism or Corporate Greenwashing? The Truth Behind Advertising Campaigns
“Drink a bottle. Save a species.”
“Every drop is green. Your FIJI Water purchase helps reduce carbon emissions and protect Fijian rainforests.”
“Fiji water is not merely the best-tasting water, it is also an environmentally responsible choice. Together with Conservation International, we are helping to save Fiji’s largest lowland rainforest…We’re also reducing CO2 emissions across our product’s entire life cycle. This includes our raw materials, the eventual recycling of our bottles, and every process in between. We then offset the remaining carbon footprint by 120%, making FIJI Water not just carbon-negative, but positively green.”
These statements are pulled directly from FIJI Water’s advertising campaigns. From the glance of an unsuspecting consumer, this bottled water brand boasting the status of “Earth’s Finest Water” appears to be the aspiring environmentalist’s drink of choice. The irony of bottled water being presented in a sustainable way is apparent, as the impact of plastic pollution on the environment is widely recognized–over eight million tons of plastic water bottles are deposited into the ocean each year, contributing to the frightening prediction that there will be more plastic than fish in the sea by 2050. Nonetheless, FIJI Water’s marketing illustrates a pure, untouched image of water collected from an artesian volcanic aquifer in the center of the Pacific. This diverts consumer attention from the devastating impacts of plastic regarding carbon dioxide emissions and ocean pollution–at the very least, prospective customers view FIJI as a better alternative to other brands, the lesser evil of inevitable environmental harm. In reality, FIJI Water is an egregious example of “greenwashing”. Greenwashing, or “green sheen”, is an increasingly popular corporate strategy that deceives the public into believing that a company’s products are sustainable or have a significant positive impact on the environment when, in actuality, this impact is minimal or nonexistent.
FIJI Water’s Untouched Campaign: “From the islands of Fiji, natural artesian water.” Source: BU Society
In the past several decades, the prevalence of media coverage on climate change has greatly increased, thus pressuring companies and industries–the majority of which, if not all, are culprits of excessive fossil fuel consumption and production–to promise changes in environmental policy. Yet, these promises are often empty, as vague advertising claims and misleading labels are often used to craft the illusion that a company’s alleged steps toward sustainability overshadow the immense amounts of greenhouse gases that they produce. The phrase “eco-friendly” is a common example of ambiguous language, as this terminology cannot be easily verified. Seldom are corporations truly committed to sacrificing profitability to protect the environment.
FIJI Water’s Carbon Negative campaign began in 2007 and was a landmark example of greenwashing. In this instance, the bottled water company’s pledges fell short, as only half of the trees for FIJI’s proposed rainforest restoration were actually planted. What’s more, FIJI’s core message is based on questionable ethics. Despite heavily exploiting the resources of the Fijian islands, FIJI Water fails to recognize that over 12% of Fiji’s native inhabitants lack access to sources of clean drinking water. After receiving backlash for their ignorance, FIJI Water ended their Carbon Negative advertising in 2010–but, this case only signified the beginning of rampant corporate greenwashing. Numerous examples of this phenomenon exist today. Volkswagen has confessed to cheating emissions tests by using defunct measurement devices. Fossil fuel giant BP changed its name to Beyond Petroleum and showcased solar panels on its gas stations while continuing to spend 96% of its annual budget on nonrenewables. Starbucks’s “strawless lid” contains more plastic than the previous lid and straw combined, and over one-third of the allegedly recycled plastic is simply shipped to third-world countries. From an environmental standpoint, this situation seems abysmal–greenwashing appears to be ubiquitous in the current economic landscape.
As consumers, it can be rather tedious to sift through product brands to find the most environmentally friendly option, especially when a large portion of supposedly sustainable products are deceptively so. Yet, the solution to this dilemma is not to abandon our search for sustainability or submit to the cynical view that there exists no ethical consumption under capitalism. Instead, we can steel ourselves to greenwashing buzzwords–“eco-friendly”, “all-natural” and even “organic” if no appropriate certification is provided–while diligently asking questions and searching for companies with absolute transparency of their environmental policies. In closing, greenwashing is a formidable roadblock on the path toward corporate sustainability. It must be recognized, however, that select companies have demonstrated legitimate dedication to becoming more environmentally conscious–to read more about their products and policies, visit my blog post listing the world’s most sustainable companies of 2022.
