Walmart

[gottaflylee]

If your still going to Walmart to buy stuff read this. Then maybe you will not walk through their doors.

PRESS RELEASE
Recreational Fishing Alliance
5724 N. Route 9, New Gretna, NJ 08224

P: 888-564-6732 F: 609-294-3812

WAL-MART GIVES $36 MILLION TO ANTI-FISHING GROUPS
RFA Says Walton Family Foundation Supports MPA & Catch Share Efforts


Wal-Mart announced this week its efforts to help fund the demise of both the recreational and commercial fishing
industry while also working to ensure that the next generation of sportsmen will have less access to coastal fish
stocks than at any point in U.S. history.
In August 16th news release from Wal-Mart corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Walton Family
Foundation announced investments totaling more than $71.8 million awarded to various environmental initiatives
in 2010, with over $36 million alone handed over to Marine Conservation grantees including Ocean Conservancy,
Conservation International Foundation, Marine Stewardship Council, World Wildlife Fund and Environmental
Defense Fund (EDF).
According to the release, the Walton Family Foundation “focuses on globally important marine areas and works
with grantees and other partners to create networks of effectively managed protected areas that conserve key
biological features, and ensure the sustainable utilization of marine resources – especially fisheries – in a way that
benefits both nature and people.”
Scott Burns, former director of marine conservation at World Wildlife Fund and now director of Walton Family
Foundation’s environmental efforts, said money will go to “protect and conserve natural resources while also
recognizing the roles these waters play in the livelihoods of those who live nearby."
The Recreational Fishing Alliance (RFA) countered that these specially managed areas of coastal waters are also
referred to as marine protected areas or marine reserves, and the end result is denied angler access, of no benefit to
the very people whom Wal-Mart claims to benefit.
“A quick visit to the Ocean Conservancy website should be telling enough for anglers interested in learning where
Wal-Mart’s profits are being spent,” said RFA executive director Jim Donofrio. “These folks are pushing hard to
complete California’s network of exclusionary zones throughout the entire length of coastline, and they’ve made
it very clear that they would like to see the West Coast version of the Marine Life Protection Act (MLPA)
extended into other coastal U.S. waters,” he said.
The release said that targeted marine areas moving forward include Indonesia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Ecuador,
Panama, the Gulf of California and the Gulf of Mexico.
“Here’s an organization which has publicly opposed creation of artificial reefs used by Wal-Mart’s tackle buyers,
in some cases openly advocating for their removal, yet the Walton family is handing over tons of money for
support,” Donofrio said of Ocean Conservancy in particular.
“Shopping for fishing equipment at Wal-Mart is contributing directly to the demise of our sport, it’s supporting
lost fishing opportunities and decreased coastal access for all Americans,” Donofrio said, adding “I hope all RFA
members across the country will remember that when it’s time to gear up, but I would also wonder if perhaps our
industry can help spread the message and support our local tackle shops by also pulling product off Wal-Mart’s
shelves.”
In April, RFA announced its support of a national boycott of the Safeway Supermarket chain (which also includes
Genuardi’s in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware) because of that corporation’s support for California’s
MLPA initiative.

"Apparently Safeway has gotten some bad advice from the people in the ocean protection racket, a community to
which the California-based mega-corporation is now donating profits," said Jim Martin, West Coast Regional
Director of the RFA. "Safeway says it is supporting groups that make a difference like the Food Marketing
Institute's Sustainable Seafood Working Group, the Conservation Alliance for Seafood Solutions and the World
Wildlife Fund's Aquaculture Dialogues, but it's little more than corporate greenwashing."
RFA believes it’s time that Wal-Mart was added to the angler boycott list as well.
“The Walton family created this huge corporate entity which has threatened the vibrancy of our local retail
outlets, and now they’re essentially doing the same thing with our fishing communities,” Donofrio said. “Much
like Safeway has done with their financial investment in the environmental business community, Wal-Mart
apparently prefers customers buy farm-raised fish and seafood caught by foreign countries outside of U.S. waters,
while denying individual anglers the ability to head down to the ocean to score a few fish for their own table.”
According to the official release, the Walton Family Foundation is also working “to create economic incentives
for ocean conservation,” while candidly pledging their support for “projects that reverse the incentives to fish
unsustainably that exist in ‘open access fisheries’ by creating catch share programs.”
“Our local outfitters and tackle shops along the coast have had to face an immense challenge by going up against
Wal-Mart’s purchasing power during the last decade, but now that the Walton family is so up front about their
opposition to open access fisheries, it’s hard for me to believe that any sportsmen would ever be interested in
shopping there again,” Donofrio said.
"California anglers have been outraged to learn that money they spend at a Safeway grocery store might end up in
the hands of extremist, anti-fishing groups like the EDF and the Ocean Conservancy, I hope more anglers will
join the national boycott by sending a message to Wal-Mart as well as Safeway,” Martin added.
According to the Walton Family Foundation website, Sam and Helen Walton launched their “modest retail
business in 1962” with guiding principle of helping “increase opportunity and improve the lives of others along
the way.” It is that principle the foundation says, that makes them “more focused than ever on sustaining the
Walton's timeless small-town values and deep commitment to making life better for individuals and communities
alike.”
RFA said grassroots efforts to combat the anti-fishing agenda are more than just an uphill climb. “The EDF catch
share coffers are already filled to the top, while Pew Charitable Trusts has billions in reserve,” Donofrio said.
“When you add another $36 million annual commitment from the Walton family each year, I can’t see how our
local efforts can get anywhere unless the national manufacturers step up and openly denounce this corporate
takeover once and for all.”
“The individual anglers and local business owners are being denied opportunity, and I hope the federal trade
representatives are willing to get onboard with their support of real small-town values,” Donofrio said, adding that
Ocean Conservancy and EDF combined received more than $10 million in Walton Family Foundation grants in
2010.

[clt_capt]

Wow - talk about being disconnected from your customers - The Walton Family foundation is biting the hand of the folks that got them where they are - Kinda like congress.

Not only are they costing Americans jobs with their crappy imported merchandise, they must be clueless about all of the hunting and fishing gear they sell

One more reason not to shop there...

[marine4003]

Personally, I'd rather run a vegetable peeler up my shin than go into wally world.....but it doesn't surprise me, alot of big corps donate money to organizations counter to what they sell or do.

[marc2061]

I wish they would concern themselves with conserving jobs for Americans. Their sales of cheap imported junk and their huge business in check cashing is hurting our economy. You can cash a napkin with someones account number on it there. it is my opinion that companies that operate like this are without any regard for this country and should not be supported by Americans.