"El Presidente." Image from Allan Sanders "Loopland." (Click to check out his gorgeous illustration portfolio.)
Marcelo Bucheli – of the University of Illinois at Urbana and Champaign College of Business – published a fascinating paper on the relationship between the United Fruit company (Chiquita) and Latin American dictatorships. Here’s the abstract:
“The US multinational United Fruit Company has been considered the quintessential representative of American imperialism in Central America. Not only did the company enjoy enormous privileges in that region, but also counted on authoritarian governments in dealing with labor unrest. The literature assumes that United Fruit and the dictators were natural allies due to their opposition to organized unionism. This paper shows that this alliance could only survive as long as the multinational provided the dictators with economic stability for the country. However, when the multinational proved to be incapable of doing that, the dictators allied with the working class to confront the multinational and extract higher rents from it.”
Bucheli is one of the most respected and thoughtful banana scholars out there. His work was primary source material for my book. You can read the whole paper (PDF download) here. (Thanks to Steven Kinzer, another primary source, for the link.)
For decades, there have been calls for justice on the industrial plantations – and in the nations that support them – for banana workers. Progress has been spotty, at best, mostly because of a disconnect between those laborers and consumers of the world’s most popular fruit. The Banana Land Campaign is a new effort to create that connection, and – unlike some others – it offers very concrete steps toward that goal. The Campaign is focusing on Colombia, where Chiquita (and possibly Dole) have made payments to terrorists, and where there’s a long history of banana-related bloodshed (see earlier posts on that topic.) Here’s a video from Jason Glaser – director of an in-progress documentary called “The Affected” – and one of the organizers of the campaign.
These are the campaign’s “Six Things You Can Do” to help make the changes that just about anyone who knows banana history need to happen:
2. Write or callDole and Chiquita’s (Chiquita doesn’t provide a email but you can write them on here) Corporate Social Responsibility Departments and ask them to make meaningful compensation to the victims of AUC (United Self-Defense Forces of Colombia) violence in the banana lands and improve their labor relations. For US citizens: Write your congressperson and Senator. There is already an investigation by Congressman Bill Delahunt of Massachusetts. being pursued in relation to Colombian paramilitary payments made by U.S. companies. However, more pressure is needed if we want to see results. Apathy gets us nowhere, only by demanding action from your government and expressing your disdain for what Dole and Chiquita have engaged in will your government see the value in pursuing this issue. You pay their salaries through your taxes, PUT THEM TO WORK!
CSR Department for Dole: dole_consumercenter@na.dole.com
Sylvain Cuperlier
Vice President – Director of Worldwide Corporate Social Responsibility
Dole Food Company, Inc.
+33 (0) 1 44 17 30 60
Write Massachusetts Congressman Bill Delahunt and let him know you think it’s important that he continue his investigation into this issue: William.Delahunt@mail.house.gov
Washington, DC
2454 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
202-225-3111
Fax: 202-225-5658
South Shore Office
1250 Hancock Street
Suite 802-N
Quincy, MA 02169
617-770-3700
Toll-Free: 800-794-9911
Fax: 617-770-2984
Cape and Islands Office
146 Main Street
Hyannis, MA 02601
508-771-0666
Toll-Free: 800-870-2626
Fax: 508-790-1959
3. Travel directly to the affected areas in Colombia. Witness For Peace and other groups are beginning delegations to the banana zone. Here you can see first hand what has occurred and work with local experts on coming up with solutions for the affected communities. For more information visit the Witness For Peace Delegations to Colombia website.
4. Volunteer for the campaign and use your talents to help bring a solution for the affected workers and families. We have space for generalists and specialists in tech, public relations, research, outreach, education, networking and more. Are you an artist? Create a piece related to this issue and we will feature it on our website. Only with a dedicated network of volunteers can we make this campaign a success. Contact Brenna McLaughlin at bl.campaign@gmail.com for more info.
5. SupportLa Isla Foundation through a donation. La Isla Foundation is coordinating the campaign and needs your support. If you don’t have money but have time you can organize a fundraising event for the campaign and the affected communities. No donation is too small, the key to success is broad based support. Contact Jason Glaser at laislafoundation@gmail.com to donate or organize an event. Soon you will also be able to donate directly at: bananalandcampaign.org
6. Eat locally as much as possible. It’s nutritious, it can be a lot of fun, it’s great for getting to know your area and community better and it takes the demand away from industrialized food and the nasty consequences it brings. (Note from Dan: Not so sure on this one, but…)
The campaign will be kicking off December 6, 2009, with a party/premiere at The Harlem School of the Arts in New York City. Open bar, music, and speakers (including me; my talk will almost certainly be made more fascinating by the free drinks.) I’ll have some comments on the campaign’s goals after the event. I hope to meet you there.
PLUS: See the film in New York Wednesday, October 21, at 7:15 PM. Details here.
But still not cuddly. Image: Fresh Plaza
After pressure from the Swedish government - efforts to boycott the banana company were underway, with a strong chance they would spread to other EU nations – Dole dropped a lawsuit it had filed against Swedish filmmaker Fredrik Gertten and his film, “BANANAS!*”, which tells the story of the company’s pesticide use in the 1970s and the damage that practice inflicted on Nicaraguan workers.
Here’s the full text of Dole’s statement:
WESTLAKE VILLAGE, CALIFORNIA – October 14, 2009 Dole Food Company, Inc. today announced that it is dismissing its defamation lawsuit against filmmakers Fredrik Gertten, Margarete Jangård and WG Film AB in the Los Angeles Superior Court, relating to the film BANANAS!*.
Dole made its decision in light of the free speech concerns being expressed in Sweden, although it continues to believe in the merits of its case. Dole strongly believes in freedom of speech and expression, which are so important in Sweden and the United States. [Emphasis added. Dole's view of our own First Amendment rights is, apparently, mostly, afterthought.]
“While the filmmakers continue to show a film that is fundamentally flawed and contains many false statements we look forward to an open discussion with the filmmakers regarding the content of the film,” said C. Michael Carter, Dole’s Executive Vice President and General Counsel.
I wrote about Dole’s financial motivation for suppressing in Sweden’s Dagens Nyheter newspaper earlier this month; the English version of the story is here. While this is a great win for the film, the question that has to be asked is why it took Swedish concerns about free speech to kill the court action. Unfortunately, I can answer that: institutions in the U.S. – ranging from our government to the Los Angeles Film Festival (which shamefully caved to Dole pressure and disavowed the film, a measure that seems all the more cowardly given this news), as well as much of our national media - generally didn’t see the banana company’s action as something worth questioning, let alone resisting.
What next? Well, if you happen to be in New York, you’ll have a chance to see the film this coming Wednesday, as part of the CMJ Music Marathon and Film Festival. Gertten will be there to answer questions (I’m going to be in attendance, as well.) One hopes that U.S. distributors will now be more open to putting the film in widespread circulation.
It is important to remember that the Nicaraguan story continues, and Dole’s attempts to discredit those who’d hold it responsible for its actions remains underway, too, as the below ad, auto-placed alongside the Los Angeles Times account of the lawsuit’s end, shows.
One more thing: the Dole release states that the company “is dismissing” the lawsuit. Actually, the proper term is “dropping.” Only a judge can dismiss a suit, something that comes with finding that suit invalid. Standard corporate press release nano-literacy or Freudian admission of the dopiness of the strategy to begin with?
The Democracy Now radio program interviewed Nicholas Kozloff, who argued that there’s a Chiquita connection in the current Honduran political crisis, which saw President Manuel Zelaya deposed in either a coup or a constitutional emergency, or both, depending on which side you’re on, in June. The banana industry once made Honduras its largest exporting nation; that changed with Hurricane Mitch, in 1986, which devastated the crop, but there’s still a huge plantation network there. Here’s what Kozloff had to say:
“…there’s this revolving door of Washington insiders that are supporting companies like Chiquita banana. I just wrote an article about Chiquita, formerly known as the United Fruit Company. And, you know, throughout history, Chiquita banana has had enormous sway and power over Central American nations.
And we know that prior to the coup d’état in Honduras, Chiquita was very unhappy about President Zelaya’s minimum wage decrees, because they said that this would cut into their profits and make it more expensive for them to export bananas and pineapple. And we know that they appealed to the Honduran Business Association, which was also opposed to Zelaya’s minimum wage provisions.
And we also—and what I find really interesting is that Chiquita is allied to a Washington law firm called Covington, which advises multinational corporations. And who is the vice chairman of Covington? None other than John Negroponte, who your previous guest mentioned in regards to the rampant human rights abuses that went on in Honduras throughout the 1980s. So I think that’s a really interesting connection.”
As I’ve pointed out earlier, assertions like this have fundamental credibility, because the banana industry’s business model absolutely mandates cheaply-produced product. Chiquita and Dole would collapse if they couldn’t sell this perishable fruit, transported from thousands of miles away, for less than any other fruit – even locally grown apples – in the supermarket. That’s why Dole sues filmmakers whose work might rally support for lawsuits brought by injured workers; and why the banana industry has been involved – time and again – in coups, bribery, payoffs, and general skullduggery (tons documented in my book and this site. Here’s a link to one of the more recent incidents.
CBS’s “60 Minutes” reran its May, 2008 segment, called “The Price of Bananas,” on Chiquita’s payments to a Colombian paramilitaries. New information included the extradition of a member of that group to the U.S., confirmation by additional sources, and the expansion of an investigation of similar alleged payments made by Dole.
I just got back from a trip to the Democratic Republic of Congo, where I was on assignment for National Geographic. More on that in the coming weeks. We were in the central part of the country. Eastern Congo – along the borders of Uganda, Tanzania, and Rwanda – has been locked in fighting for years now, and the battles have ratcheted up since last August, resulting in a huge humanitarian crisis, with hundreds of thousands of people being forced into refugee camps, along with thousands of deaths.
The region is where people depend on bananas as part of their diet more than anywhere else in the world, and the fruit there is being attacked by what is probably the most virulent banana disease: a fungus bacterium called Xanthomonas wilt. Its spread can be slowed through clean-farming techniques – making sure tools and clothing are kept free of dirt as they move from village to village – and there have been extensive informational campaigns designed to carry this information to local families, who would face starvation if the disease hit their crops.
The image above is of Laurent Nkunda, the leader of the Congolese rebels. It appeared last year in the pages of a magazine called Jeune Afrique (Young Africa). He’s vowing that he will take his forces all the way to Kinshasa, the Congolese capital. His fortunes have since changed, but the disease hasn’t – and the poster behind him, which advertises how to stop it, will probably outlast his reign.
Update: Nkunda’s reign is over. He was arrested yesterday in Rwanda, his former state sponsor. The Guardian has a good piece on it.
THE BANANA BLOG is about the world's most endangered - and dangerous - fruit. THE BIG PARADE is about stairways, route and transit geekery, and pedestrian pursuits in Los Angeles. You can also read all the topics at once, which might also include productivity, geekery, DIY whatever, mountain biking, stuff that I think is funny that nobody else likely will, and other boring, useless crap.
Read and Buy Some Books
Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman recommends it.
Listen to my interview on NPR's Fresh Air.
My own op-ed in the New York Times.
allan_sanders-2006-el-presidente-773353.jpg "El Presidente, by Allan Sanders")
Nobel Prize winner Paul Krugman 
