After Ford, its Coke and Chrysler

We heard about the record breaking loss suffered by Ford Motor Company in 2006, which is not such a surprise given the state of the oil-addicted world unable to find a cheap fix.

Now it is the turn of another purveyor of well-packaged junk, Coca Cola. This symbol of poor health and water theft around the world has reported a drop in earnings and an erosion in its share price.

This is the report from Bloomberg: Feb. 14 (Bloomberg) -- Coca-Cola Co., the world's largest soft-drink maker, said fourth-quarter profit fell less than analysts anticipated on increased demand for soda in China and Russia and healthier beverages such as bottled water in Mexico.

Net income declined 22 percent to $678 million, or 29 cents a share after its largest bottler wrote down the value of its North American unit, the Atlanta-based company said today in a statement. Excluding that, Coca-Cola earned 52 cents, topping analysts' estimates by 2 cents.

We must beware the designs of this water raider because it has said its rise in volumes is coming from markets outside the United States. In most of these markets, such as India, Coke simply sucks up groundwater in poorly supervised surroundings and pursues an aggressive advertising campaign using local film stars to sell its stuff.

Even more interesting is the report that Daimler Chrysler is looking for a buyer for its ailing acquisition, the Chrysler division. This American carmaker is to shed some 13,000 jobs, of which 11,000 are part-time workers. Shifts will be cut down in some plants and a profit now looks possible only in 2008. No one knows what the world will look like in that year, as the atmosphere is pumped with more greenhouse gases each minute, steaming up the climate.

If you are also addicted to oil, the end of the good life is nigh.

Expect Ford to step on the gas in India

Ford, the iconic American car company that symbolised consumer utopia by mass manufacturing vehicles for the common man early in the 20th century has hit another massive speed breaker with a fourth quarter loss of 5.8 billion dollars and an annual loss of 12.7 billion dollars for 2006 (reports Reuters).

This is, according to the agency, the worst year in the 103-year history of the company. Last year, heavy job cuts sounded the alarm that Ford is running out of fuel (as the auto industry generally is bound to be in the developed world).

The question that should interest us Indians is the response from loss-ridden international automakers to the emerging scenario of global warming, costlier fuel and supply lines that are linked to the vagaries of geopolitics and the general unsustainability of motorisation in the developing world, of which China and India are the prime examples.

It is fairly certain that the losing carmakers will compete more aggressively in the developing markets; price cuts, cheaper (and unsafe) models, petrol/diesel guzzlers, higher emission engines and a tacit campaign against public transport are all being witnessed even today; we will see more of it.

The positive feature is that the frenzy of car sales has a GLOBAL climate impact, which is likely to send more Katrinas hammering the US coastline, as much as the typhoons in South East Asia and the seemingly unending monsoon downpour in Mumbai, all of these being very lethal weather phenomena.

If Indians are concerned about the future of the planet, and, that of their children, they should persuade the Manmohan-Chidambaram-Ahluwalia caucus against encouraging fuel-guzzlers from hitting Indian roads, whether they are from loss-ridden Ford, Chevrolet, Skoda, Hyundai, Suzuki, Toyota, Mercedes, Tata...

We need cheaper, modern buses that are rolled out on Indian roads by the tens of thousands each month. Why, if cars can be imported and sold (to supplement domestic manufacture), why not buses? And trains? and trams?

If the automakers are going to try to press the pedal further, we may have nowhere to run for cover.

Let us remember what Andre Gorz said long ago. It is simply impossible for everyone to want to buy a part of the beach, because that would give each person a few inches of beachfront; that cannot be used by the owner in any practical way. Ditto for the car. If all of us had a car each, none of us would be able to use them!