On a basketball court in central Kinshasa, capital of the Democratic Republic
of Congo, a brass band is playing the national anthem. The Minister of
Health and other dignitaries from this war-ravaged African country are
gathered for speeches, songs and a hastily rehearsed play. The cause of such
pomp and celebration would seem bizarre to the people of all but a handful
of countries. A huge campaign to vaccinate millions of women, aged 14 to 49,
against tetanus – a disease that most often strikes mothers and their
newborns but which British mothers have not had to contend with since the
1950s – is getting under way.
Unknown to most of those attending the opening ceremony, and the lines of
women who soon begin queuing to receive their injections at a small table by
the side of the court, the country’s first national campaign to eliminate
tetanus is the result of British babies’ bottoms.
The vaccinations have been funded by sales of Pampers nappies. They are part
of the parent company Procter & Gamble’s partnership with Unicef, the
United Nations’ Children’s Fund, and evidence of a trend that is sweeping
the developed world. Corporate social responsibility (CSR), the umbrella
term for myriad campaigns and policies churned out by companies in response
to the rise in so-called “ethical consumerism”, is the business trend of the
moment. Small wonder, given that 83 per cent of us claim that a company’s
social responsibility is an important consideration when buying a product or
service, according to the pollsters Ipsos Mori.
CSR has taken countless formats, from carbon offsetting to volunteering
schemes for company staff. But one of the most popular ways for businesses
to stress their green or socially sound credentials, and to win over a
growing army of ethical shoppers, is to pledge a percentage of sales to a
good cause. Last year, 24 per cent of us bought a product because of its
link to a charity. In this case, for every packet of Pampers sold in the UK
between October and December last year, P&G pledged to give Unicef the
money for one tetanus vaccination as part of the charity’s bid to eliminate
the disease worldwide. Nine months and 7.4 million nappy packets later, the
result is queues of anxious Congolese women, many receiving their first
vaccination, and a cause for playing the national anthem.
“Babies die within days of being born”
It is impossible to calculate exactly how many the disease kills in a country
the size of Western Europe, where four million people died recently in a
savage war and more than 1.6 million are still displaced. Every year,
250,000 babies and 30,000 mothers are officially killed by maternal and
neonatal tetanus (MNT) worldwide. The Democratic Republic of Congo is one of
eight countries that together account for three quarters of these numbers,
but experts believe the global death toll is far higher. Unicef estimates
that about 25,000 Congolese newborns were affected by the disease last year.
Many of their mothers will have perished, despite the fact that the cheap
and easily administered tetanus vaccine is available in some health centres
to pregnant women.
Less than 30 per cent of the population have access to these centres. Many do
not know about the disease, or how easily it can be caught via cuts and
grazes from the soil and animal faeces. They are unaware that cutting an
umbilical cord with unsterile instruments, or traditional practices such as
rubbing it with ashes or mud, can allow the disease into a newborn’s body.
As a result, it is often the unclean conditions of a baby’s birth that leads
to its rapid death.
“The babies come here suffering fevers, convulsions and spasms. They usually
die within ten days of being born,” says Dr Boy, at his hospital in rural
Maluku, 46 miles east of Kinshasa. “Often the mothers don’t think about
coming here until it is too late.” Sister Filomene, a nurse in the still
more remote village of Lukalenge, tells a similar story: “Women give birth
in their houses. Recently, after one birth, they cut the umbilical cord with
a razor. Both mother and baby were infected and died.”
In a dark corner of Filomene’s health centre, another mother attempts to feed
her infant child, its muscles already stiffened from the tetanus poison, a
serum that may yet save its life. But while the vaccines provided by Unicef
are free, other medical treatments here must be paid for by the patient.
This mother cannot afford the full course of serum and is waiting to hear
whether the church will fund the rest. Nevertheless, this mother, who can
afford at least some medicine, is one of the luckier ones.
Witnessing her, but also talking to ministers, government officials, medics
and Unicef staff, it is clear that the drive to eliminate tetanus has not
been dreamt up overnight to provide Pampers with something to advertise on
its nappies. “The Government has planned these vaccinations since 2005, but
they haven’t got off the ground because of a lack of funds,” Dr Shudu,
Health Minister for the province of Kasai Oriental, says. “Because the rest
of the world doesn’t have tetanus, it’s not a priority.”
For Pampers, a brand targeted at mothers and babies, MNT was the perfect focus
for a charity partnership. Unicef can at last help the Democratic Republic
of Congo to finalise and implement its vaccination plans, after nappy sales
generated enough money for medical teams to visit 52 of the country’s 210
health zones this year and a further 66 in the first half of next year. Much
of the money for the final stage will come from a renewed partnership with
Pampers between now and December.
Good news for P&G balance sheet
Nkopo Beya, 21, doesn’t know, or appear to care, who funded her first
vaccination. The mother of one hadn’t even heard of the campaign until a man
with a megaphone came to her village of Kabinda the day before. She took his
advice to get vaccinated, despite her concerns, “to protect myself and my
babies; it is a good thing”, she smiles.
Hers is one of many positive stories resulting from this campaign.
Nevertheless, no ethically minded consumer should be under any illusion that
P&G has linked itself to Unicef’s valiant work purely for altruistic
motives. Each tetanus vaccination costs only 2.5p, a fraction of the profit
that Pampers must generate. Last year’s target was to fund six million
doses. The fact that the final tally was 7.4 million is great news for the
Democratic Republic but also for P&G’s balance sheet, representing a
huge increase in sales over the three months that Unicef’s logo appeared on
Pampers packets. From this month P&G has expanded the campaign across
Western Europe and aims to raise funds for 10 million further vaccinations
from UK sales alone.
The benefit is more than financial. Visits to the Pampers website increased by
40 per cent during the last campaign and research showed that consumers’
perceptions of the brand improved significantly thanks to its partnership
with such a highly-respected charity. For a relatively small outlay, P&G
secured increased sales and an enhanced standing among its all-important
consumer base.
Aimee Goldsmith, the external relations manager for P&G, says that
Pampers’ consumers even helped the company to decide which cause their nappy
purchases should support: “We talked to them about what to do. Customers
don’t want to pay more for the product, which they don’t, but they do have
to buy nappies. This was about mothers helping other mothers. Consumers
loved it.”
Social change or ethical figleaf?
Some campaigners find this hard to swallow. Dan Welch, a researcher for Ethical
Consumer magazine, says that the Pampers-Unicef link-up presents
socially aware shoppers with a “false ethical choice”. Pampers, he points
out, ranks bottom in his magazine’s forthcoming report on ethical nappies,
partly because of the product’s hefty contribution to the world’s landfill
sites. “It would be better to put 10p in a charity box and buy nappies from
a company that engages in the real social, environmental and ethical issues
of its own sector,” he says. More generally, he adds, “corporate social
responsibility is all too often an ethical figleaf in response to increased
activism and consumer awareness. On one level, giving money to good causes
is great, but I am uncomfortable linking the idea of donating to good causes
and buying a product. It distracts people from the real issues.”
Research from America, however, suggests that these partnerships can provide
the charities involved with vital exposure and a sustained increase in
donations as well as generating much-needed funds in the short term. Almost
four-fifths of Americans (79 per cent) are more likely to buy a product that
supports a charity, but 76 per cent also have a more positive image of the
charity or tell a friend about it.
For Dr Michel Kazatchkine, the executive director of the Global Fund to Fight
Aids, TB and Malaria, this is a win/win situation. His organisation’s
partnership with RED – a range of products made by corporate partners from
Gap to American Express that has already raised £22 million for the fund –
“has rapidly shown that it is possible to do good business while also doing
good”, he says.
Mayaz Rahman, who manages the Pampers campaign and other corporate
partnerships for Unicef UK, says the charity’s work would be impossible
without the funds the schemes generate. “Nevertheless, we screen all our
partners rigorously. We turn down many more offers than we accept, but it is
vital that we protect Unicef’s reputation,” he says. “For us, these
campaigns offer more than just money. We get huge exposure for Unicef’s
work, and lots of donations and lasting interest from people who have found
out about us through buying a product. It’s not just about Pampers getting
good PR, its about both organisations benefiting from each other’s networks.
And it delivers real results for children, which is our priority.”
For more information, unicef.org.uk/pampers
