Nestlé: Perrier water production threatened

The Nestlé Waters company has been invited by a French health authority, the Occitanie regional health agency, to consider making “another use” of its Perrier mineral water packaging site, the press reported on Monday French.

The French subsidiary of the Swiss giant, also owner of the Vittel brand in France, has been the subject of controversy since January concerning its use, in the past, of disinfection treatments. These treatments are not dangerous, but prohibited for mineral waters, which must have a natural quality that allows them to be dispensed with.

Nestlé Waters had to stop operating one of its boreholes at its Perrier packaging site in Vergèz, in the south of France, in April after the discovery of bacteria of faecal origin.

In a report dated August, cited by Radio France and “Le Monde”, the regional health agency (ARS) of Occitanie judged that these “bacterial contaminations”, although “punctual”, are “unacceptable for a natural mineral water. She “invited” Nestlé Waters to “strategically question another possible food use of the exploitation of current mineral water catchments”, report the two media.

Nestlé Waters, for example, owns the Maison Perrier brand, which does not benefit from the mineral water designation and can therefore be subject to disinfection treatments.

According to the two media, ARS Occitanie concluded in August that the use of certain unauthorized treatments, which include UV lamps and carbon filters, had ceased on the Vergèze site. On the other hand, she considered that microfiltration, the regulations for which were relaxed by the government in 2023, is “not regulatory” in that it has a “proven disinfectant effect”.

The report also mentioned a “virological risk”, with microfilters not having “a retention effect on viruses”.

“We operate the Vergèze site in accordance with the framework set by the authorities and under their control,” reacted to AFP Nestlé Waters, who did not wish to comment on the report before its final version.

Socialist senator Alexandre Ouizille, rapporteur for the parliamentary commission of inquiry into the practices of bottled water manufacturers, said Monday that the report was “damning” for Nestlé Waters and for the authorities.

The French government was notified by Nestlé in 2021 of its use of prohibited treatments, according to the company. The authorities then, without publicizing the matter or informing consumers, relaxed the regulations.