Dive Brief:
- Nestle SA CEO Paul Bulcke gave testimony Wednesday for a harassment lawsuit filed by a former employee, who alleged she had been ignored and then harassed after trying to bring food safety concerns to the company's attention.
- Bulcke said he didn't remember the details of a 2006 meeting that former food safety director Yasmine Motarjemi said was vital to her allegations.
- Bulcke denied Motarjemi's argument that she was psychologically harassed by her superiors, saying that people enjoyed working at Nestle, demonstrated by the fact that Nestle employees have an average 25-year tenure in addition to his own 36 years at the company.
Dive Insight:
Motarjemi was hired as Nestle's food safety director in 2000. She said she began voicing concerns about food safety lapses and was allegedly psychologically harassed from 2006 on until finally being fired in 2010. Motarjemi is looking for 2 million Swiss francs ($2 million) in compensation to account for her legal and medical costs and 50% of 10 years of lost earnings.
"The case is potentially embarrassing for the company, which has denied the charges of harassment and food security lapses, as the popularity of its brands hinge on consumers’ loyalty," according to Bloomberg.
Jean-Marc Duvoisin, Nestle's former head of human resources and now chief of its Nespresso business, also took the stand Wednesday, commenting that he had never seen Motarjemi being harassed. He did note that while she and her boss, Roland Stalder, then Nestle’s director of food quality, may have shared "irritations" from time to time, the relationship was allegedly professional.
Bulcke and Duvoisin were two of four senior executives providing testimony during the trial, which began earlier this month.