Trade Unionists strategise to effectively empower banana workers

Just one more year to go to the end of the three-year Comic Relief Project,Trade Unions are currently evaluating the road covered and what still lies ahead, for complete success of the project.

The project which has as purpose to empower and educate banana workers to improve on their living standard, is being organised within two trade unions, FAWU (Fako Agricultural Workers Union) in Cameroon and GAWU (General Agricultural Workers Union) in Ghana.

During a three-day workshop which recently held in Limbe (January 21-23), stakeholders drawn from FAWU, GAWU, Banana Link and IUF, met to assess selves and put in strategies to effectively empower and educate workers in the banana sector.

From reports presented during the meeting, both FAWU and GAWU highlighted as achievements, success in empowering workers on their rights, increased membership, workers now more conscious of financial management, reduced sexual harassment, duty conscious, reduction in long working hours, reduction in accidents, improved working relationship between workers and management, gender rights and responsibilities etc.

Talking to The SUN,FAWU General Secretary, Charles Mbide said “It is generally known that work in the banana sector is so tedious and very demanding and that it involves the usage of chemicals, so a project like this make workers to know exactly what their rights are and also to see how they can improve on productivity”.

In Cameroon, the project is being implemented basically in three banana plantations; Boh, CDC and PHP Tiko section.

Talking specifically on the reduction in working hours which is a landmark achievement of the Comic Relief project, Charles Mbide said “before, workers used to close very late; about 11pm and get up for the next day at 4am; we found that to be very uncomfortable as it was affecting production negatively, so we tried to negotiate with management for them to understand that it was not good for workers to stay for very long hours in the plantation, and this has been resolved in some of the plantations”.

However, Charles Mbide noted that the challenges are still many, “the provision of PPE (Personal Protective Equipment) is still a problem, most of the workers go without adequate PPE, we are working on that and also on how management can provide essential working materials”.

Also, other trade unionists said the project was quite tedious as it involves a lot of field work, where they deliver talks to the workers in order to empower and educate them so that they can effectively improve on their living and working standards. Thus, they requested that the period should be extended.

Explaining the possibility of the extension of the project, Jacqui Mackay,International coordinator of banana link said“We can ask the funder if they will consider continuation of the funding, but we will have to be able to present to them good reasons and what we think we will achieve with more funding. Nonetheless, there are other opportunities that have been secured to ensure that FAWU works with other stakeholders to improve the social and environmental standards of workers”.

Jacqui Mackay told The SUN that the current success is very high in terms of the efforts the trade unions are putting in empowering their workers, “they are doing everything they can to ensure that workers are aware of their rights and responsibilities. There is also a very good relationship between FAWU and the management which is beneficial to all, and management, workers and the union are all seeing how much can be achieved for everybody in the banana sector, when people work together and understand everyone’s needs and responsibilities”.

Discussion also focused on dialogue on how the project addresses women’s employment and engagement in trade unions, how to raise worker awareness of their rights, plantation visit to see worker education session etc.