DOHA: Local dealers of the Kuwait Danish Dairy (KDD) products have launched a publicity campaign to repair the damage caused to these products by the Danish cartoon controversy.
KDD has already made it clear that except the "Danish" part in its name, it had nothing do with Danes. It is 100 per cent Kuwaiti owned company and none of its products, which comprise various juices, tomato pastes etc, is manufactured in Denmark or use any Danish ingredients, the company said.
The claims could be true, but the damage was already done, with many hypermarkets and supermarkets across the Gulf, including Qatar, removing all KDD products from their shelves. At few outlets where the products were available, people boycotted them for the same reason.
A senior official of the Transind Company in Doha, the sole dealers of KDD products in Qatar said the "misunderstanding" had caused a decline of more than 60 per cent in sales of KDD products.
Transind is now planning a massive campaign in a bid to repair the damage. KDD in Kuwait has already procured a certificate from the Dean of the College of Shariah and Islamic Studies at the Kuwait University and a similar certificate from the Kuwait Chamber of Commerce and Industry saying that KDD is a Kuwaiti shareholding company owned and operated by Kuwaiti citizens. The Danish partners of the company had sold their shares to the Kuwaiti partners long ago. They have also certified that that company is not using any Danish ingredients in any of its products.
Transind has gone one step forward, by securing a letter from the Qatar Chamber of Commerce and Industry endorsing the certificate issued by its Kuwaiti counterpart.
"We are planning to distribute 5,000 copies of these three letters in all the mosques in Doha on Friday," the official said.
He added that Transind, which distributes products of various other companies, has already stopped dealing in all Danish products to protest against the blasphemous cartoons of Prophet Mohammed (PBUH).
© The Peninsula 2006
