Author: hag
Last saved by: Helen
Company: um

Help to beergirls is possible

I read with interest but also again with disappointment your article “Beergirl is a dangerous profession” in the NRC of 6 October, about beergirls in Cambodia and the role of Heineken.
Beer brewer Heineken states that it cannot solve the situation as the only company. I would like to report, however, that Heineken did do so in Africa in 2006, where they supplied as first and only company free antiAIDS medication to their personnel. This experience of Heineken could be used easily in the Cambodia beergirl situation, and in this way another first could be achieved. Why this hasn’t happened so far (for years!) has nothing to do with Heineken alleged impossibility to act alone. A suggestion of gender-inequality (female beergirls vs male brewery workers) in a publication in the Lancet has been firmly denied by the brewery.
The problems of the beergirls in Cambodia has a direct link with their work. They include not only a high number of HIV infections, but also violence and respectlessness in the workplace. This is not adequately handled by Heineken, as studies from this summer once again show, while the company has shown it is capable to do so. The question remains: why not?

Dr Tiny van Merode, Maastricht