Pascual Boing is a Mexican

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

 fruit juice

Juice

Juice is the liquid that is naturally contained in fruit or vegetable tissue.Juice is prepared by mechanically squeezing or macerating fruit or vegetable flesh without the application of heat or solvents. For example, orange juice is the liquid extract of the fruit of the orange tree...

 and soft drink

Soft drink

A soft drink is a non-alcoholic beverage that typically contains water , a sweetener, and a flavoring agent...

 company.

Following a lengthy strike and bankruptcy in the 1980s, the company is now a worker-run co-operative

Worker cooperative

A worker cooperative is a cooperative owned and democratically managed by its worker-owners. This control may be exercised in a number of ways. A cooperative enterprise may mean a firm where every worker-owner participates in decision making in a democratic fashion, or it may refer to one in which...

. Pascual Boing is one of the few Mexican worker-owned companies that have national presence, making inroads into the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

 and Central America

Central America

Central America is the central geographic region of the Americas. It is the southernmost, isthmian portion of the North American continent, which connects with South America on the southeast. When considered part of the unified continental model, it is considered a subcontinent...

n markets. Currently they have several plants in Mexico

Mexico

The United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...

, but their headquarters are in their historical plants in Mexico City

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

.

Pascual's flagship products are a range of non-carbonated drinks that contain real fruit juice or fruit pulp. The available flavors include mango

Mango

The mango is a fleshy stone fruit belonging to the genus Mangifera, consisting of numerous tropical fruiting trees in the flowering plant family Anacardiaceae. The mango is native to India from where it spread all over the world. It is also the most cultivated fruit of the tropical world. While...

, tamarind

Tamarind

Tamarind is a tree in the family Fabaceae. The genus Tamarindus is monotypic .-Origin:...

, strawberry

Strawberry

Fragaria is a genus of flowering plants in the rose family, Rosaceae, commonly known as strawberries for their edible fruits. Although it is commonly thought that strawberries get their name from straw being used as a mulch in cultivating the plants, the etymology of the word is uncertain. There...

, grape

Grape

A grape is a non-climacteric fruit, specifically a berry, that grows on the perennial and deciduous woody vines of the genus Vitis. Grapes can be eaten raw or they can be used for making jam, juice, jelly, vinegar, wine, grape seed extracts, raisins, molasses and grape seed oil. Grapes are also...

, apple

Apple

The apple is the pomaceous fruit of the apple tree, species Malus domestica in the rose family . It is one of the most widely cultivated tree fruits, and the most widely known of the many members of genus Malus that are used by humans. Apple grow on small, deciduous trees that blossom in the spring...

, orange

Orange (fruit)

An orange—specifically, the sweet orange—is the citrus Citrus × sinensis and its fruit. It is the most commonly grown tree fruit in the world....

, guava

Guava

Guavas are plants in the myrtle family genus Psidium , which contains about 100 species of tropical shrubs and small trees. They are native to Mexico, Central America, and northern South America...

, pineapple

Pineapple

Pineapple is the common name for a tropical plant and its edible fruit, which is actually a multiple fruit consisting of coalesced berries. It was given the name pineapple due to its resemblance to a pine cone. The pineapple is by far the most economically important plant in the Bromeliaceae...

, soursop

Soursop

The Soursop is tripti broadleaf, flowering, evergreen tree native to Central America, the Caribbean and northern South America, Colombia and Brazil, Mexico, Peru, Venezuela, Soursop is also native to sub-Saharan African countries that lie within the tropics. Today, it is also grown in some areas...

 and peach

Peach

The peach tree is a deciduous tree growing to tall and 6 in. in diameter, belonging to the subfamily Prunoideae of the family Rosaceae. It bears an edible juicy fruit called a peach...

. Pascual uses about 20 thousand tons of fruit annually and 24 thousand tons of sugar. In late 2005, following a request from Greenpeace

Greenpeace

Greenpeace is a non-governmental environmental organization with offices in over forty countries and with an international coordinating body in Amsterdam, The Netherlands...

, Pascual Boing certified that it does not use GMOs

Genetically modified organism

A genetically modified organism or genetically engineered organism is an organism whose genetic material has been altered using genetic engineering techniques. These techniques, generally known as recombinant DNA technology, use DNA molecules from different sources, which are combined into one...

.

History

Pascual was founded in the 1940s by Victor Rafael Jiménez Zamudio. During the 1982 economic crisis, the government decreed a compulsory 30% raise to all workers, including those of private companies. Pascual's owner claimed he could not afford such a raise, so the workers went on strike. After some time, the government ruled in the workers' favor. The owner then declared bankruptcy, and Pascual closed. The workers were given the chance to buy the company and they did. Pascual bought the company assets, but it also took possession of private land belonging to the wife of the owner, Victoria Valdéz Cacho de Jiménez. This land was not part of the company assets but rented; it was important because it held two water wells which Pascual could exploit for free, thereby lowering its production costs. When the rent contract expired in 1985, Victoria Valdéz refused to renew it, but Pascual kept the land anyway with government support.

Victoria Valdéz was allowed to sue in 1989, and won the case in 2003. When the court ordered Pascual to be evicted, politician Andrés Manuel López Obrador

Andrés Manuel López Obrador

Andrés Manuel López Obrador , also known as AMLO or El Peje, is a Mexican politician who held the position of Head of Government of the Federal District from 2000 to 2005, before resigning in July 2005 to contend the 2006 presidential election, representing the unsuccessful Coalition for the Good...

, then Mayor of Mexico City

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

, expropriated the land from Valdéz to give it to Pascual, claiming the company created employment and wealth. By 2005 the Supreme Court

Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation

The Supreme Court of Justice of the Nation is the highest federal court in the United Mexican States. It consists of a President of the Supreme Court and ten Ministers who are confirmed by the Senate from a list proposed by the President of the Republic.Justices of the SCJN serve for fifteen...

 decreed this expropriation to be illegal, since it did not benefit the public but a private company that produced a non-essential product. Valdéz wants her property back, while Pascual wants to retain the water wells which it can exploit for free, besides the technical expense of moving the plants or building their plants in other states. If they are evicted, Pascual will not close, as they are now a national company, but it would set back their expansion plans and increase their operating expenses as they would no longer have free water.

Pascual does not see itself as a private, for-profit company; they claim that being worker-owned (a cooperative

Cooperative

A cooperative is a business organization owned and operated by a group of individuals for their mutual benefit...

) they perform a social function and as such expropriation in their favor is for public benefit. The have received support from the PRD

Party of the Democratic Revolution

The Party of the Democratic Revolution is a democratic socialist party in Mexico and one of 2 Mexican affiliates of the Socialist International...

 party, and together they are deciding their course of action. Publicly discussed options are (see, and, in Spanish):

1. To make their case against the Supreme Court that it is technically unfeasible to evict Pascual, thus forcing Valdéz to accept an indemnification.
2. Alejandro Encinas (PRD), the new Mayor of Mexico City, has proposed to repeat the expropriation. The legality of this action is unclear.
3. To somehow convince Victoria Valdéz to sell the property to them, despite her steadfast refusal to do so. If Valdéz agrees, the money would be obtained either via a low-interest credit from Mexico City's government or by a donation drive.

Pascual has another problem – they are not allowed to exploit the water wells they had been using since 1985, since the exploitation permit is in the name of Victoria Valdéz and it cannot be transferred. This could be cause for sanctions.

Pato Pascual

In 1940, Pascual began using a mascot and logo based on Disney's Donald Duck

Donald Duck

Donald Fauntleroy Duck is a cartoon character created in 1934 at Walt Disney Productions and licensed by The Walt Disney Company. Donald is an anthropomorphic white duck with a yellow-orange bill, legs, and feet. He typically wears a sailor suit with a cap and a black or red bow tie. Donald is most...

. The character, Pato Pascual (Pascual Duck), prompted legal action from Disney in the 1980s that led to a slight alteration in its appearance. Later, after renewed complaints from Disney, Pascual changed the logo once again, giving the duck a backwards baseball cap.