For those of you who can't understand why so many of us get our knickers in a twist about formula marketing and advertising..Have a look at this and you will. Believe me,you will

[moondog]

Nestle and the way they operate on Bangladesh. From today's Guardian

I'm not interested in getting involved but I do agree that the 'inferior' was a bit insulting and thereis an implication there

sweetheart, you did. i know that's not fabulous to hear but you know yourself that BM is better for babies. but the fact that you gave your baby the alternative (but not equivalent) product does not make you an inferior mum. it's just one of those forks in the road that a lot of us have to face.

Well is breastmilk better for human babies than formula milk? There's plenty of evidence to show that it is. 'Ergo' formula is an inferior product. Doesn't mean that it can't be lifesaving and wonderful when breastmilk isn't available for whatever reason.

Sorry, I didn't think there was. I thought inferior was a factual word, not a judging one.

I really don't know what other word to use to compare formula milk to breast milk. What is another word for inferior that doesn't carry an "implication"?

Seriously, I'm not being argumentative for the sake of it, I honestly don't know what other word to use, and I'm not prepared to pretend that breast milk and formula milk are equal. They are not.

nah, mossie, it's not an equivalent, therefore one is superior and one inferior. a fact rather than a judgement.

Looks like we've come down the the reasons behind deegwards opinions. No one is questioning your choices or parenting or whether or not you did the right thing for your son, this isn't personal, it's about a multinational and its unethical strategies.

Oh and I'm sorry if I upset you deegward, it wasn't intentional, it didn't occur to me that you would read anything about you personally into my comments. I thought I was simply describing a neutral fact, I forgot that there's a lot of emotion around this subject. (Blimey how can one forget that on Mumsnet!)

Yes I'm a freedom of choice kind of person as well but I have the luxury of having both the education (being able to read and write) and tools (eg internet) to sort out fact from fiction before I make choices. I suspect Nestle target the 3rd world because the people have access to neither of these and the countries have less than robust legal systems capable of upholding international treaties.

You only have freedom of choice if it is an informed choice.

And in most cases, formula feeding isn't a fully informed choice. Even in the educated west.

It's only since I came on Mumsnet that I've learned so much more about breastmilk and formula milk. And I thought I knew quite a lot about it. (And I knew more than most of the midwives I came across.)

I thought I was making an informed choice. I now know I wasn't. It took me a lot of reading and learning to find that out.

Nestle are real bastards. I for one am really going to try and boycott, but I didn't realise they owned so many different products.

Isn't corporate greed great? the richer you are, the more immune to punitive measure you are it would seem.

Of course they are exploiting the fact that many Bagladeshi women are illiterate and unable to make sense of the misinformation being peddled. That is abuse in my book.

"Boco, no sorry someone on here said formula is not a subsitute for breast milk, it is inferior, ergo I did not do the best for my baby which I did"

This isn't logical, at all. Of course you did the best for your baby, the very best you could. That doesn't mean your baby got the best milk - through no fault of either you or your baby he or she had formula instead of breast milk. That doesn't mean you didn't do your best for them.

It is very very hard to separate those things when thinking about personal experience, but when it comes to debating feeding issues at an abstract level it's important to try to do so. At this 'big picture' level, it's important to be clear: formula is the second-best milk of the two. All mothers do the best they can for their babies. For some things, the best we can do for our babies is give them something that as it happens isn't the 'objective' best thing as measured in a laboratory, but which nevertheless is best for us in our circumstances, or is the only option we've got.

here the link to that pic that I was talking about earlier
Hope the link works

otherwise scroll down here to the Picture with the heading Twins-postcard

that picture kills me, 3andnomore.

It is terrible isn't it...I rememebr that teh first time I ever came across it I just cried

If you go to the 2. link, on the Babymilk action website, there is the "story" with the picture, that makes it even more heartbreaking....and I must say that, if I remember correctly it was the first time I saw that picture, that I made my mind up about Boycotting Nestle.

the other postcards I'm rather dubious about....don't like the pics of breatfeeding in cars- it is not clear at all whether the cars are moving or not, and seems to give the message that not having your baby strapped in is normal

Oh the one with the twins

toddler trying to feed from Barbie was funny, though

deegward, I may have come across a bit harsh to you in my posts, and I am sorry about that - that was before you revealed the personal stuff.

We do all sorts of things that are 'inferior' with our kids, not just feeding, because circumstances demand it from time to time - it's part of being a parent. We (mostly) get over it in time and learn to live with it. I have done, and do, loads of 'inferior' things....I could give you a list

What we shouldn't do, if we can possibly help it, is to allow it to skew our general opinions - you had a bad time breastfeeding and felt criticised for using formula, therefore Nestle's despicable behaviour in Bangladesh is giving poor women 'choice' and boycotters should shut up???

It doesn't figure

Oh yes, my DD tries to feed her Dora the Explorer doll which never fails to make me smile.

The article and the picture of the woman feeding her twins has completely shocked me.
These women are clearly being exploited, it's just awful.
I just didnt realise that this was going on but I will be boycotting nestle from now on. Honestly, it's just dreadful, I want to cry.

That picture is so sad

This has made me more determined to carry on BF for another 6 months at least and not give a penny to Nestle.

What worries me is that there is so little information about formula - scientists are too scared of the big food manufacturers to publish anything detrimental about formula as they would never get funding again.

I think it links well with the recent statistics of the majority people giving at least some formula to their babies from 6 weeks. People are not making an informed choice because the information is not out there.

Deegward, it's hard to view a woman dressed in a nurse's uniform with N*** emblazoned across it offering nutritional advice in a shop and tins of formula with no instructions in the local language as 'marketing their product'. I've personally witnessed both those situations in Indonesia and it's wrong, wrong, wrong.

Other companies are busy buying up clean water sources so what people once had for free or minimal cost they now have to pay extortionate money to receive, not to mention the environmental costs of the processing and all those plastic bottles and the transport required.

Thankfully, here in Nigeria the formula companies seem not to have the hold they have in Indonesia. Consequently, there are no big displays of tins in shops and no insidious marketing of milk for various other stages of life - the nursery age child, the school pupil, the adolescent child, the pregnant woman, the elderly.

Even so, our driver's wife was considering putting her bf baby onto SMA because it is expensive which she thought meant it must be the best. But another new dad was telling me proudly the other day that his 7mth old baby now sleeps the night through as long as he 'has both breasts' before he goes to sleep.

oh jaysus, tapster, you've let the genie out of the bottle now...
moondog has another link for you, i fear...