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2008 BEIJING OLYMPICS - RETAIL

Carrefour faces Chinese online boycott bid

Tuesday 15 April 2008

Chinese netizens have launched a campaign to boycott the French retail giant, Carrefour, via the Internet and text messages following the Olympic torch's embarrassing passage through Paris. (Report: R. Tompsett)

Special Report The Beijing 2008 Olympic Games

Tuesday 15 April 2008

By Reuben Easey

For a more in-depth discussion, don't forget to watch the edition of our programme The Debate on April 16 at 7:10 pm GMT+1.

A campaign to boycott French firms in China appears to be gathering steam, with thousands of text messages sent out to encourage Chinese citizens not to shop at French supermarket chain Carrefour. Other companies targeted include the luxury goods firm LVMH, and cosmetics company L’Oréal.

Protests against the Olympic torch when it passed through Paris, and the refusal by president Nicolas Sarkozy to rule out a boycott of the opening ceremony have angered many Chinese people.

Several French newspapers carried anxious headlines on Tuesday, fearing that French economic interests in China were ‘under threat’ because of the boycott.

Carrefour potentially has the most to lose: The supermarket giant has more than 100 hypermarkets in China, and there have already been demonstrations outside some of its stores. It has also been accused of financing the campaign for Tibetan independence, something which the company strenuously denies.

L’Oréal, meanwhile, has come under fire because its subsidiary, the Body Shop, promoted a tour of Australia by the Dalai Lama in 2007.

All potentially worrying stuff for French firms, but the true impact of such a boycott, if in fact it occurs, should not be overstated. However many thousands of angry comments may have been posted on Chinese blogs and message boards in the last few weeks, it’s still not a reliable gauge of public feeling in a nation of more than 1.3 billion people.

Moreover, as our Beijing correspondent Henry Morton points out, there were similar calls for a boycott of Japanese goods in 2005 after the then-Japanese Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi insisted on visiting a controversial war shrine. In the event, it had no noticeable effect on the balance sheet of Japanese firms. It’s something French business leaders might want to bear in mind in the run up to Beijing 2008.

[1] reactions :

25/04/2008 07:30:00

westerners should get to know China better

By michael hui

for the past 30 years ,China's openning up to the world has made chinese know west more than Westerners know China so far. many improvements and progress happened in China. people have more rights than any time before. Olympics give Chinese a chance to exchange ideas and more with the world, and this is also a chance for westerners to get to know China more . but unfortunately this Games was being used as a confrontation with China by some stupid people in the west. China is large country and very complicated than normal westerners think. and any issue concerning China should be considered carefully . many Chinese has good impression on some leading western media, but reporting on Tibet damaged this impression. so dont blame Chinese for their nationalism, Chinese has their way of thinking and conception towards this world, we should get to know them better before criticizing and commenting......................