Money and Morals: A Time Line

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April 2001 -- Tobacco maker Philip Morris launches an ad campaign to promote its delivery of Kraft macaroni and cheese to Albanian refugees. Industry insiders estimate that the campaign costs $1 million, far more than the $125,000 the company spent on 43 tons of noodles and cheddar.

August 2001 -- Eleven major corporations, including General Motors, Monsanto, Dow Chemical, and DuPont, create the Green Power Market Development Group, a partnership designed to build profitable corporate markets for green power.

2002 -- Bainbridge Graduate Institute and Presidio School of Management launches MBA programs in sustainable business.

January 2002 -- General Motors pays $100,000 to use a Chumbawumba song in a Pontiac jingle; the anarcho band donates the entire sum to CorpWatch and IndyMedia to launch environmental campaigns against GM.

April 2002 -- U.S. Representative Dennis Kucinich of Ohio proposes that the Federal Bureau of Audits survey the financial statements of all publicly traded companies. The proposal fails by a vote of 39 to 381.

September 2002 -- Thanksgiving Coffee in northern California is the first U.S. company to switch to a 100 percent biodiesel truck fleet.

May 2003 -- Thirty-nine percent of shareholders in the Yum! Brands company (KFC, Pizza Hut, Taco Bell) send a symbolic message by approving a resolution requiring the company to explain how all policies will ensure economic, social, and environmental sustainability.

September 2003 -- More than two-thirds (68 percent) of Alabama voters reject legislation proposed by Republican governor Bob Riley to shift the state's tax burden to the rich; Riley cites God's mandate 'to take care of the least among us' as his motive.

February 2004 -- Atlanta-based company Fashion Victim copyrights the iconic image of revolutionary leader Che Guevara snapped by photographer Alberto Korda in 1960.

June 2004 -- Coca-Cola, McDonald's, and Unilever, with the blessings of Greenpeace and the UN Environment Programme, meet in Brussels to find alternatives to ozone-depleting refrigerants.

September 2005 -- Jefferson Parish president Aaron F. Broussard says of the federal response to Hurricane Katrina, 'If the American government would have responded like Wal-Mart has responded, we wouldn't be in this crisis.'

February 2006 -- UPS orders 50 hybrid electric delivery trucks, a shipping-industry first.

March 2006 -- The International Organizationfor Standardization (ISO) announces a new ISO standard for social responsibility.

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