In 2003, the Student Union of University College Dublin (UCD) led a campus wide campaign to educate and encourage students to act on banning Coca-Cola products on campus in response to alleged human rights abuses by the corporation in Columbia.
Coca-Cola became increasingly associated with anti-union activities in Colombia, where paramilitaries with documented links to the government regularly abducted, intimidated, tortured or murdered trade union leaders, based on reports from Columbian trade union Sinaltrainal.
During the debates over the potential ban, UCD was the largest student market for Coca-Cola as Ireland’s largest university. The referendum led by the Students’ Union to ban the sale of the company’s products in student union outlets on campus was passed with 59 per cent in favour of the ban. This was one of the first college-based campaigns in the world to boycott Coca-Cola. Since then, more than 200 colleges have followed the example, including Trinity College, the National College of Art and Design, NUI Maynooth and Queens University, Belfast.
Produced by: UCD Student’s Union
Year: 2003
Irish Global Solidarity in 100 Objects is organised by developmenteducation.ie, an online hub focused on learning about the unequal and unjust shape of the world today, and is coordinated by Aidlink, Concern Worldwide, the Irish Development Education Association, the National Youth Council of Ireland, Self Help Africa, Trócaire and 80:20 Educating and Acting for a Better World.
DevelopmentEducation.ie is part funded by Irish Aid.
