The Co-op - caring, sharing and boycotting

Here's news of a victory for BDS involving the "caring sharing" Co-op.  See The Boycott Israel Network (BIN):

Palestine human rights campaigners today welcomed news that the UK’s fifth biggest food retailer, The Co-operative Group, will “no longer engage with any supplier of produce known to be sourcing from the Israeli settlements”.

The Co-op’s decision, notified to campaigners in a statement, will immediately impact four suppliers, Agrexco, Arava Export Growers, Adafresh and Mehadrin, Israel’s largest agricultural export company.  Mehadrin sources produce from illegal settlements, including Beqa’ot in the Occupied Jordan Valley.  During interviews with researchers, Palestinian workers in the settlement said they earn as little as €11 per day.  Grapes and dates packaged in the settlement were all labelled ‘Produce of Israel’.

Mehadrin’s role in providing water to settlement farms and its relationship with Israeli state water company Mekorot makes the company additionally complicit with Israel’s discriminatory water policies.  Other companies may be affected by the Co-op’s new policy if they are shown to be sourcing produce from Israel’s settlements in the Occupied Territories.

Someone told me recently that the Co-op might not be as cooperative as its name suggests though it does have some kind of profit share and decision-making scheme for its customers. It's still good news for BDS.