MLive | 13 January 2026

Amway loses $3 billion dispute after Mexico seized its 692-acre organic farm

By Brian McVicar

An international tribunal dismissed Amway’s request for $3 billion in damages after the Mexican government in 2022 seized a 692-acre organic farm owned by the multi-level marketing company and gave it to communal landowners.

Amway was ordered to pay Mexico $1.3 million in legal fees.

In July 2022, the Mexican government cited a 1939 presidential resolution, aimed at redistributing land to poor farmers, when it granted Amway’s El Petacal farm to the Ejido San Isidro, a communal landowning group.

Amway, which grew and processed ingredients for its Nutrilite vitamins and supplements at the farm, challenged the land seizure in 2023 in the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID), an arbitrator between governments and investors.

Separately, the company has also sought relief in Mexican courts, achieving a temporary suspension of the transfer of part of the 692-acre farm in Southwestern Mexico to the Ejido San Isidro.

In the ICSID case, Amway said its land was taken without compensation, in violation of international treaties and Mexican law. It also pointed to a 1994 agreement, which Amway says has been upheld in Mexican courts, that provided alternate land to the Ejido San Isidro, satisfying the 1939 presidential resolution.

The tribunal rejected Amway’s claim.

In November 2025, a three-person ICSID tribunal dismissed the company’s lawsuit, ruling that it didn’t have jurisdiction under a provision of the U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement, or USMCA. One tribunal member issued a dissenting opinion.

“Amway disagrees with the tribunal’s ruling which came as a surprise to us, and we acknowledge the strong dissent,” according to the company, which says it lawfully purchased the farm in 1992 and 1994.

The Mexican government applauded the ruling.

“The outcome of this arbitration constitutes a significant achievement for the Mexican State, an important precedent in the field of investment arbitration, and clearly demonstrates the unfounded nature of a multi-million-dollar claim,” according to a statement posted on the Mexican Ministry of Economy’s website.

Through a separate legal challenge, Amway says a Mexican national court temporarily blocked the transfer of 395 acres of its 692-acre farm to the Ejido San Isidro. Amway still operates on those 395 acres, but it says the farm’s organic certification is in jeopardy.

“Amway depends on the pristine nature of the farmland to maintain organic certification for the ingredients grown at El Petacal,” Amway said. “The Ejido San Isidro do not consistently use or care for the seized land, which compromises Amway’s ability to maintain the organic certification on the remaining land in its possession.”

The suspension will remain in effect until the case is fully resolved, Amway said. The company, founded in 1959 by Jay Van Andel and Rich DeVos, said it didn’t have an estimate of when that would be.

Amway, whose products span health, beauty and home care, employs more than 14,000 people worldwide, more than 2,500 of whom work in Ada.

A Fight Over Land and Livelihoods

The land dispute has big implications for Amway and the Ejido San Isidro.

The Ejido San Isidro have described the 2022 land seizure as the culmination of a decades-long fight to gain control of property that was promised, but never provided, to their ancestors in 1939, according to local media reports.

“This land has been defended, first against the landowners and the hacienda bosses, and then came the worst part: the government handed the land over to a transnational corporation instead of the peasants, and they destroyed everything—the wildlife, everything,” Raúl De la Cruz Reyes, president of the Ejido San Isidro council, said in a 2022 story in Pie de Página. “We see them extracting products, but the villages remain poor because the wealth is taken abroad.”

For Amway, the land requisition is a blow to Nutrilite, the company’s line of vitamins and supplements sold worldwide.

Nutrilite, whose products include protein powders, meal shakes, sleep gummies, and an assortment of vitamins and supplements, accounts for the “majority” of the company’s nutrition product sales.

Nutrition products are a key part of Amway’s bottom line, making up 64% of the company’s $7.4 billion in global sales in 2024, according to the company.

El Petacal plays a critical role in the Nutrilite product line.

Located in the state of Jalisco, Amway describes the farm as a “remote, pristine valley” where it grows organic crops including alfalfa, citrus fruits and leafy greens. It also produces herbs such as sage, parsley and rosemary, as well as chia and cacti.

Along with farms in Washington state and Brazil, it’s one of four locations where Amway grows ingredients for its Nutrilite products.

Over the years, the company invested millions in El Petacal.

To transform the farm into a hub for its “seed to supplement” operation, the company constructed roads, bridges and irrigation systems. Amway also extended electricity lines to the farm and community, installed potable water systems, and built sewage facilities, research labs and processing facilities.

El Petacal was a major employer in the area, according to Amway.

During peak season, more than 300 people worked at the farm, planting, cultivating and harvesting crops. Once hand-plucked from the soil, the fruits, vegetables and plants were washed, shredded, dehydrated and thermally processed.

After workers pack and store the ingredients, they’re shipped to Amway manufacturing facilities in the U.S.

“The Nutrilite operation on the subject property was the first source of employment in the local community,” Amway wrote in a legal filing. “It did more than contribute to the local economy. The Nutrilite investment actually created that economy.”

Amway estimated its losses from the farm at $3 billion

The damages stem from lost profits, idle equipment, and the loss of its property and the improvements it made there, according to legal filings. Also included is the cost of relaunching operations at another location, which Amway said would take three years.

“Our damages continue to grow as does the disruption from the legal battles and management’s efforts to evaluate our farming options,” Amway said.

In addition to investments at the farm itself, Amway also highlighted community development projects it supported near El Petacal.

Amway says it “contributed substantial resources” for the construction of a church, a soccer field, and the maintenance of an elementary school and gardens, legal documents show. A community center built by Amway sponsored nutrition programs, English language courses, arts and crafts workshops, and served as a venue for first aid.

How Mexico Reclaimed the Land

Amway’s ownership of El Petacal was revoked in 2022.

That July, Mexico’s Secretariat of Agrarian, Territorial and Urban Development notified the company it was requisitioning the farm, citing a 1939 presidential resolution that the Ejido San Isidro says was never fully executed, according to legal filings.

Amway said the move was “unlawful,” and that the Mexican government provided 692-acres of alternate land to the Ejido San Isidro in 1994, satisfying the 1939 presidential resolution.

“In 1994, the San Isidro farmers were granted and accepted 280 hectares of land from the Mexican government in satisfaction of a 1939 presidential land grant,” the company said in a statement. “The Ejido San Isidro agreed this satisfied all governmental obligations to them. This agreement has been tested and upheld repeatedly in Mexican courts.”

Amway also points to a 1942 Mexican government resolution that it says exempted El Petacal from the 1939 resolution.

The company, in April 2023, filed a request for arbitration with the ICSID, an arbitrator between governments and investors that’s affiliated with the World Bank.

Amway’s arbitration request said Mexico’s actions flout protections guaranteed under the North American Free Trade Agreement and its successor, the USMCA. Those protections include taking land without compensation and due process, and a requirement that foreign investors receive treatment equal to domestic investors.

“This expropriation constitutes a stark breach of international law,” Amway wrote.

The Trade Agreement Technicality that Decided the Case

The tribunal’s deliberations did not center on Mexico’s use of the 1939 presidential resolution to requisition Amway’s land.

Rather, the case hinged on a provision of the USMCA, Annex 14-C, that was designed to protect investments made before NAFTA ended in 2020.

Amway argued the provision kept NAFTA’s protections—including safeguards against property seizures—active for three years after the USMCA took over.

Mexico disagreed, saying the provision only allowed arbitration, not the protections themselves. The country argued it couldn’t be held responsible for a breach of NAFTA that wasn’t in place when the alleged violations occurred in 2022.

The tribunal sided with Mexico.

One member of the three-person tribunal, Franco Ferrari, a New York University law school professor, issued a dissenting opinion.

He argued Annex 14-C of the USMCA was meant to protect legacy investments both procedurally and substantively for three years after NAFTA ended.

“In my opinion, Mexico’s restrictive reading of Annex 14-C, espoused by the majority of the Tribunal, turns the transition regime into a legal mirage, a promise of continued consent that evaporates the moment an investor relies on it because a State engaged in the very conduct that may trigger recourse to arbitration,” he wrote.

A Historic Victory for Ejido San Isidro—and a Continuing Battle

The Ejido San Isidro celebrated when Mexico requisitioned El Petacal in 2022 and granted them title to the land, according to local media reports.

“It’s been 83 years of struggle,” Raul De la Cruz, the president of the Ejido Commission of San Isidro, said in a July 2022 story in Pie de Página. “Today, something that our grandparents were supposed to receive back in 1939 is finally happening. Today is a historic day.”

The story by Pie de Pagina, an independent journalism outlet focused on social and human rights issues, described Amway’s ownership of the land as an affront to the Ejido San Isidro’s dignity.

“The first right they are denied is their right to property,” Carmen Figueroa González, an attorney representing the Ejido San Isidro, said in the Pie de Pagina story. “They do not have possession of it, they cannot travel across their lands, they cannot cultivate them, and this has a consequence: it leads to hardship, not a better life.”

Amway disputes that its ownership of the farm hurt the Ejido San Isidro.

“Amway’s stewardship of the land and investment in the community has been extraordinary,” the company said in a statement. “Amway has improved the land, ensured its organic nature, helped build community infrastructure, and improved the regional economy and the lives of the El Petacal area residents.”

Moving forward, Amway says it will seek to regain ownership of the entire 692-acre farm through “appropriate forums.”

“We continue to believe strongly in the protections afforded under applicable international agreements and under Mexican law,” the company said. “We will exhaust all efforts to ensure that Mexico fulfills its obligations to protect our investments in order to maintain the micro- and macro-economic gains that El Petacal and Amway have generated for all stakeholders, including Mexico.”