Following a month-long campaign, the Milk Food Factory Workers Union at the GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Horlicks factory in Nabha in Punjab state in northwest India, has won permanent employment for 452 casual workers employed on a 'temporary’ basis for more than a decade.

When the US-based Schreiber Foods Inc acquired a 51 per cent stake in Dynamix Dairy Industries in 2004, one of India’s most advanced milk processing plants was transformed into a global company.

SIPTU, the union for hotel workers in Ireland has launched a campaign to support hotels which hotels which treat workers fairly and promote quality jobs in the industry Over 40 hotels across Ireland where workers have collective bargaining rights have signed up to the campaign, encouraging union members and consumers who care about workers rights to use these hotels.

A close vote to accept a mediated proposal on May 24 has brought an end to nearly two months of conflict around renewal of the collective agreements in the Finnish food sector. The General Council of the Finnish Food Workers voted to accept the government mediators' proposal, which preserves existing shift and working time arrangements against employer efforts to stretch the working day to as long as ten hours.

Trade unions from around the world have called on the French-based Accor Group to immediately enter into negotiations to redefine the scope and content of the international trade union rights agreement signed with the IUF in 1995. The call came from the IUF's annual global meeting of member unions in the hospitality, tourism and catering sectors, which was held in Ankara, Turkey May 17-18.

Strike action scheduled to begin at 19 hotels in Sweden's 3 largest cities on early morning May 17 has been averted with the conclusion of a new 2-year collective agreement between the Swedish Hotel and Restaurant Workers' Union (HRF) and the employers association. The conflict had gone into mediation as the strike deadline approached and other unions had announced active support measures.

Iranian teacher union activist Farzad Kamanger was executed in Tehran's notorious Evin prison on May 9, together with 4 other political prisoners. The families have not been allowed to claim their bodies. Teachers' unions, the IUF and other international trade union organizations, Amnesty International and other human rights groups had campaigned for his release following his 2008 conviction on ludicrous charges of "endangering national security" and "enmity against God" in a mock 5-minute trial.

We never bought it, so we can't change the recommendation to sell - but we have taken a closer look at the rating put on Nestlé's Creating Shared Value Report 2009 in order to investigate the reporting criteria - and whether they've been met.