莫迪在印度 India has made noodles out of Modi’s message
When Nestlé’s Maggi noodles were declared one of India’s most trusted consumer brands last year, alongside Colgate, Dettol and Nokia, a Bangalore commenter on the Economic Times of India’s website retorted: “It is time that India and Indians wipe out all foreign brands from this list. It needs to make its mark in the world.”
去年，雀巢(Nestlé)旗下的美极(Maggi)面条同高露洁(Colgate)、滴露(Dettol)及诺基亚(Nokia)一起荣获印度最受信任的消费品牌时，班加罗尔的一名评论员在印度《经济时报》(Economic Times)网站上反驳道：“现在是印度和印度人民将所有外国品牌从这一榜单上清除的时候了。印度需要在世界上留下自己的标志。”
By coincidence, what one minister dubbed the country’s “Inspector Raj” was about to take action. A Food inspector plucked a Maggi packet from a shop in Uttar Pradesh in January, starting a farcical sequence of events that culminated in Nestlé incinerating 400m packets of innocent noodles. Only this week, after global sales were dented, has the brand returned to the shelves.
巧合的是，印度一名部长所称的“检验员拉吉”(Inspector Raj)正打算采取行动。今年1月，一名食品检验员从北方邦(Uttar Pradesh)的一家商店拿走了一包美极面条，从此引发了一系列闹剧，最终导致雀巢销毁了4亿包其实没什么问题的面条。只是在最近（在美极面条全球销量下降后），该品牌才重新在印度上架。
Narendra Modi, India’s reform-minded prime minister, is visiting the UK and Turkey this week, bearing his “Make in India” appeal to multinationals, backed by the easing of barriers to foreign direct investment. But the Maggi noodles case shows that national leaders may talk but tax authorities, food inspectors and local bureaucrats often do not listen.
致力于改革的印度总理纳伦德拉莫迪(Narendra Modi)最近对英国和土耳其进行访问，承诺减少针对外国直接投资(FDI)的壁垒，用“在印度制造”(Make in India)的口号吸引跨国公司。但美极面条事件表明，不管国家领导人说了什么，税务部门、食品检验机构及地方官僚体制常常当作耳旁风。
In claiming — on the basis of disputed evidence not backed up by other countries’ findings — that Nestlé’s noodles contained too much lead, India’s main food inspection body blithely undermined Mr Modi’s welcome. It added to a growing realisation among multinationals that emerging markets are not the one way bet, full of eager customers, they once hoped. These are tricky territories in which it is easy to get entangled.
声称雀巢生产的面条含铅量超标（基于有争议的证据，而这些证据并未得到其他国家检验结果的支持）之举，意味着印度主要食品检验机构满不在乎地打破了莫迪的欢迎姿态。这进一步增强了跨国公司本已日益强烈的意识：新兴市场并不是他们曾经期望的单向押注，满是踊跃的消费者。这些是棘手的地方，外国企业很容易陷入麻烦。
In a sense, they always knew it. Only the truly naive thought it would be as easy to move into China as into Cincinnati. But the risks appeared to be containable, especially when they were being lured by smiling politicians, and the rewards for leaping into the unknown great. In practice, there have been more pitfalls than some realised and lesser rewards.
从某种意义上说，他们一直都知道这一点。只有真正幼稚的人才会认为进入中国像进入辛辛那提(Cincinnati)一样容易。但以往风险似乎可控，尤其是在他们受到笑脸相迎的政客吸引、而跃入未知所带来的回报巨大之时。但在现实中，他们遇到了比预想更多的陷阱、更少的回报。
The economic climate does not help. China’s rate of growth has dropped and Brazil and Russia are expected to contract this year. Goldman Sachs has closed its Brics fund, dedicated to profiting from the potential of Brazil, Russia, India and China, due to underperformance. Foreign investors can no longer surf a wave of rapid growth.
经济环境也不给力。中国经济增速已经下降，巴西、俄罗斯经济预计今年将出现萎缩。由于表现不佳，高盛(Goldman Sachs)已关闭了旗下的金砖国家(Brics)基金，后者旨在获益于巴西、俄罗斯、印度和中国的增长潜力。外国投资者再也无法搭上快速增长的顺风车。
Meanwhile, the regulatory setbacks multiply. Nestle’s noodles imbroglio follows others for foreign multinationals in India, notably over tax. Vodafone won a victory in the Mumbai High Court last month over an effort by India’s tax authorities to raise its liabilities by hundreds of millions of dollars. The same court ruled last year in favour of Shell over a similar claim.
与此同时，监管方面带来的挫折不断增多。雀巢面条风波与在印度的其他外国跨国公司的遭遇如出一辙，特别是在税务方面。上月，沃达丰(Vodafone)在孟买高等法院获得了胜诉，此前印度税务部门试图让该公司补缴数亿美元的税款。去年，孟买法院在一起类似的案件中做出了有利于壳牌(Shell)的判决。
Foreign multinationals can at least rely on the Mumbai court to be dispassionate. Its judges gave short shrift to the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI) in August, describing its decision to ban nine varieties of Maggi noodles on the basis of flawed tests as in breach of natural justice.
外资跨国公司至少可以信赖孟买法院作出公正判决。8月，该院法官未理会印度食品安全与标准局(FSSAI)，称该局基于有缺陷的检测禁止9类美极面条出售的决定违反了自然公正原则。
Other countries are equally testing. GlaxoSmithKlinewas fined 300m by a court in China last year after becoming a public example in its crackdown on bribery. Sifiso Dabengwa, chief executive of the South African mobile company MTN, which sells services across Africa and the Middle East, resigned on Monday after regulators in Nigeria fined the group $5.2bn.
其他国家同样也很棘手。在成为中国打击贿赂的公开案例后，葛兰素史克(GlaxoSmithKline)被中国一家法院罚款3亿英镑。南非移动通信企业MTN（在非洲及中东各地提供服务）首席执行官思费索达本古瓦(Sifiso Dabengwa)在尼日利亚监管机构对该集团罚款52亿美元后最近宣布辞职。
Foreign multinationals are not the sole targets of officious supervisors. Nor are they solely at risk in emerging economies, as European banks have found in the US. Several large Chinese state-owned enterprises and their senior executives have suffered badly from the country’s anti-corruption campaign. But foreigners present obvious targets when times are tough.
外资跨国公司并非好管闲事的监管机构的唯一目标。他们也并非只在新兴经济体遭遇风险，欧洲的银行在美国也同样遭遇风险。几家大型中国国有企业及其高管在该国的反腐运动中遭受了严重冲击。但在艰难时期，外资企业更容易成为靶子。
That puts a premium on fitting in, not merely by adapting the Big Mac to local culture and selling Chicken Maharaja Macs instead, but becoming part of the fabric of the economy. “You cannot afford to be regarded as the imperialist. You must show how you benefit the country,” says Peter Williamson, a professor of international management at Cambridge university.
这意味着必须付出额外代价“入境随俗”，不仅仅是让“巨无霸汉堡”(Big Mac)适应当地文化，转而销售“鸡肉大王汉堡”(Chicken Maharaja Macs)，而且还要成为当地经济的一部分。“你承受不起被视为帝国主义者的后果。你必须展示自己如何让所在国家受益，”剑桥大学(Cambridge University)国际管理学教授彼得威廉森(Peter Williamson)说。
But Nestlé did not do very much wrong, and certainly not enough to deserve a 20 per cent fall in its sales in India. Its mistake came after the fact rather than before, in failing to respond quickly and assertively enough to the accusations. By the time it hit back, the claim that its noodles were poisonous was all over social media. Nestlé was no arriviste trying to cram a global product down local throats. It has operated in India for 103 years and started manufacturing there in 1961. Maggi has been a popular brand since its launch in 1983 — noodles that could be cooked in a few minutes, were cheap enough for most people and fitted with their busier lives.
但雀巢并没有做错什么，肯定不至于让其在印度的销售额下降20%。雀巢的错误在于在事件发生后没能快速、自信地回应指控。等到雀巢作出反驳时，关于其面条有毒的传闻已经传遍了社交媒体。雀巢并不是试图让当地人接受某款全球产品的新来者。它已经在印度经营了103年，并且早在1961年就开始在印度生产。自1983年推出以来，美极一直是广受欢迎的品牌——这种几分钟即可煮熟的面条对大多数人来说足够便宜，而且适合他们的忙碌生活节奏。
Nestlé India has been quoted on the Mumbai exchange since 1968; it employs 7,000 people directly and another half a million indirectly; it takes milk and dairy supplies from 100,000 farmers in Punjab, Haryana and Rajasthan; it runs global research and development for noodles in India; and it has nine health laboratories. It is not, in other words, a stranger.
雀巢印度(Nestlé India)自1968年就在孟买交易所挂牌上市；它直接雇用7000人，间接为50万人提供就业；它从旁遮普邦(Punjab)、哈里亚纳邦(Haryana)和拉贾斯坦邦(Rajasthan)的10万户农民那里收购牛奶和乳制品；它在印度对面条进行全球研发，而且拥有9个健康实验室。换句话说，印度人对雀巢并不陌生。
It is customary in such cases to ask what the big corporation should have done better and Nestlé will learn lessons, especially in how it communicates. But it was India’s fault rather than Nestle’s and the moral for growth economies is this: if the rewards for coming to your country have fallen, you must reduce the risks too.
在此类事件中，人们往往会问，大公司怎样才能做得更好，雀巢将吸取教训，尤其是在沟通方面。但这是印度（而不是雀巢）的过错，该事件对增长型经济体的寓意是：如果你国的投资回报下降，那么你必须把风险也降低些。
