Amcor has sacked its chief executive after former staff in Australia were suspected of being involved in an illegal operation to drive up box prices.
The scandal has already knocked eight per cent off the company's shares. Amcor has now accepted the resignations of chief executive Russell Jones and Australasian head Peter Sutton, and has promised to cooperate with ongoing investigations.
Investigations into possible collusion began after the Amcor filed a lawsuit seeking the return of confidential information taken from company by five top people who had quit its Australian cardboard box division. Last month, the Federal Court ordered the former executives to return any such confidential information.
Less controversially, Wal-Mart vice chairman Thomas Coughlin has announced that he will retire in January 2005, with his duties being divided among senior management.
According to the low-price giant, Wal-Mart Stores US president Mike Duke will take on further responsibilities for logistics and for the Wal-Mart Stores finance and compliance office. Wal-Mart International president John Menzer will lead its global procurement division, and the firm's real estate and store planning division will go to Tom Hyde, executive vice president of legal and corporate affairs.
The Walmart.com division will be led by chief financial officer Tom Schoewe and the retailer's new diversity office will be headed by Lawrence Jackson.
Mike Foster will retire as president of ADM Alliance Nutrition at the end of the year. Foster joined ADM in 1997 after the company acquired Moorman's, and became president when ADM Alliance Nutrition was formed when the group merged with Consolidated Nutrition.
The Confederation of the Food and Drink Industries of the EU (CIAA) has appointed of Daniela Israelachwili as its next director general. As from January 2005, she will succeed Raymond Destin following his retirement at the end of the year.
"I welcome Daniela Israelachwili's appointment, confident that her long and broad-based experience of business associations as well as of European affairs will help to steer CIAA through a period of growth and further development in support of the European food and drink industry representation in Brussels," said Jean Martin, CIAA president.
Rexam chairman Rolf Börjesson has been appointed to the board of Avery Dennison, a global leader in label materials based in California, US. The company recorded sales of $4.8 billion in 2003.
Börjesson is a busy man; in addition to his board responsibilities at Rexam, he is a director of SCA, one of the world's largest pulp and paper manufacturers based in Stockholm, Sweden and a board member of Copenhagen Airports A/S, a publicly traded Danish company.
Martin Klaus Nielsen is the new president of Danisco Emulsifiers. He will join Danisco on 1 March 2005.
And finally PepsiCo's former vice president of industry relations, Stephen Caldeira, has been named president and CEO of The Elliot Leadership Institute, a not-for-profit organisation dedicated to executive development in the $430 billion foodservice industry.
Caldeira will succeed Kathleen Wood, a co-founder of The Elliot Leadership Institute who has served as President since it was founded in January 2003.