"I believe terrorism cannot be won over by military action. ... We must address the root causes of terrorism to end it for all time. I believe putting resources into improving the lives of poor people is a better strategy than spending it on guns."I'm sure the entire speech will appear on the Grameen Bank website at some point, and I'll post it later.
Sunday, December 10, 2006
Nobel Prize
Mohammad Yunus accepted the Nobel Prize today. Courtesy of the International Herald Tribune, from Mohammed Yunus' Nobel Prize speech:
Conscious Capitalism: Whole Foods Markets
I have mixed feelings about Whole Foods.
I applaud their leadership on the trans-fat issue. (And am relieved that my parents can shop there -- my dad had a heart attack several years ago -- and know that all purchases are trans-fat free.)
On the other hand, I have impressions: the husband of a friend closed his small natural and organic foods business (in crunchy Portland, Oregon!) due to pressure from larger competitors, including Whole Foods.
That said, I don't know why his business really closed; there could have been a ton of other factors. Maybe his small business couldn't offer employees the same level of benefits offered by Whole Foods. I'll have to polish off one of my SBA references, but I think that while small business creates most new jobs, they pay more for a wide range of things, including employee benefits packages.
Or was Whole Foods so big, and did it enter the market so hard, that it stressed the local business ecosystem?
Last year I did an ayurvedic cleanse, which involved eliminating sugar from my diet for a few weeks. I was amazed at how many of the products sold at Whole Foods contained forms of sugar.
The Whole Foods near my parents' home in Illinois has a customer "question and comment" board. (This would be impossible in NYC!) Last month, a customer had asked about the ubiquitous presence of some form of sugar, like cane syrup. The question prompted a somewhat admonitory response from store management: this is a natural product.
Well, yeah. Sugar is a natural product, but it is not a healthy ingredient of every element of every meal. It is odd to find forms of sugar as an occult ingredient in "natural" products like almond milk. Ok, "brown rice syrup" is listed on the label: buyer beware.
But I digress. I just wanted to direct people to Whole Foods chairman John Mackey's blog post on conscious capitalism.
I haven't finished it yet, but look forward to spending some time with it. (Probably not today!)
And I'll report back on the Whole Foods podcast, which I found online this morning.
I applaud their leadership on the trans-fat issue. (And am relieved that my parents can shop there -- my dad had a heart attack several years ago -- and know that all purchases are trans-fat free.)
On the other hand, I have impressions: the husband of a friend closed his small natural and organic foods business (in crunchy Portland, Oregon!) due to pressure from larger competitors, including Whole Foods.
That said, I don't know why his business really closed; there could have been a ton of other factors. Maybe his small business couldn't offer employees the same level of benefits offered by Whole Foods. I'll have to polish off one of my SBA references, but I think that while small business creates most new jobs, they pay more for a wide range of things, including employee benefits packages.
Or was Whole Foods so big, and did it enter the market so hard, that it stressed the local business ecosystem?
Last year I did an ayurvedic cleanse, which involved eliminating sugar from my diet for a few weeks. I was amazed at how many of the products sold at Whole Foods contained forms of sugar.
The Whole Foods near my parents' home in Illinois has a customer "question and comment" board. (This would be impossible in NYC!) Last month, a customer had asked about the ubiquitous presence of some form of sugar, like cane syrup. The question prompted a somewhat admonitory response from store management: this is a natural product.
Well, yeah. Sugar is a natural product, but it is not a healthy ingredient of every element of every meal. It is odd to find forms of sugar as an occult ingredient in "natural" products like almond milk. Ok, "brown rice syrup" is listed on the label: buyer beware.
But I digress. I just wanted to direct people to Whole Foods chairman John Mackey's blog post on conscious capitalism.
I haven't finished it yet, but look forward to spending some time with it. (Probably not today!)
And I'll report back on the Whole Foods podcast, which I found online this morning.
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