"The history of the Foro Emaus"

A GRASS ROOTS AND ECUMENICAL STRUGGLE FOR THE DEFENSE OF LIFE

By Hernán Hermosilla of the Foro Emaus.

For almost a century, Costa Rica has been a banana producing nation. At the end of the XIX century the transnational United Fruit Company installs its operations in Costa Rica. Later on it moves from the Caribbean to the Southern Zone, and eventually abandons the country on account of the strike of 1984. Several companies return to the Atlantic Coast of Costa Rica with millionaire investments. From 1985 onward the transnational companies begin to pressure the government to develop a Plan for the Promotion of the Banana Industry, which gives them juicy benefits by way of tax exemptions and fiscal grants. This included a legal change, that went from a business entity directed by the National Banana Association (ASBANA), to a National Banana Corporation (CORBANA), in which governmental representatives also participate. This new turn implied the authorization to expand its territories into new agricultural land, the deregulation of environmental and worker norms, and a strategy to eliminate the independent unions, replacing them with pro-management Solidarista associations. Since then, there has been a veritable worsening of the quality of life in the surrounding communities and a negative effect on the environment and biodiversity. Labor rights began to deteriorate rapidly, and a new stage began, characterized by the violation of the human rights of Costa Rican banana workers and of other ethnic minorities of our country and Panama, as well as an intense exploitation of a foreign labor force, in parti-cular those without a clear migratory status. In the mid-1980s a management strategy began to be tried out in the Atlantic Zone of Costa Rica aimed at destroying labor unions, that at that time had a strong presence in the banana plantations. This was achieved with the combination of various factors, among which was the approval of a Law that permitted the creation of worker-management associations known as Solidarista Associations; the employment of legal devices to discontinue the Collective Conventions and by pressures placed on the easily manipulated permanent committees, and the signing of Direct Agreements between groups of workers and the banana companies, not to mention the complicity of the national press, linked to powerful economic interests. This situation was further aggravated by errors committed by the labor union movement, such as the abuse of the right to strike, and ideological dependence which connected its leadership with of political parties, and not responding to the vital needs of workers and their families. This si-tuation was taken advantage of by the promoters of Solidarismo. This process culminated in fewer than ten years with the elimination of the Collective Conventions, the principal legal instrument the Labor Unions counted on to regulate greater equity in worker-management relations. Since 1989, the international situation began to change rapidly. Because of the changes in the Soviet Union and in the Socialist countries of Eastern Europe, the transnational banana companies that controled banana production and commercialization, saw in the fall of the Berlin Wall, the opportunity to increase their banana markets into the ex-socialist countries, and made plans to expand banana production in Costa Rica. This proposal for the expansion of banana plantations in Costa Rica, received the seal of approval from the government economists.The uncontrolled expansion of banana plantationsThe aim of increasing the area under banana production was to have a greater amount of boxes of export bananas by the early 1990s, no matter what the social or environmental costs. The result was an uncontrollable banana expansion.The Project of Expansion was based on several conditions: a) Availability of new lands. This was made possible by pressuring small farmers to sell their land and after buying them up, cutting down the primary and secondary forests on them, so that with the subsequent forestry inspections, permits for changes in land use could be obtained, these now being "appropriate lands for banana plantations." b) Financial capital. The companies had the financial capital by way of their own funds and by way of credits from the nationalized bank that made banana loans a priority. c) Abundant supply of labor. The supply of labor was abundant with the ex-small farmers that now became salaried peons, and with the migration of labor from other regions of the country (Central and North), as well as the unstoppable mass of undocumen-ted migrants, principally form Nicaragua, fleeing from grave economic, social and political conditions. d) Low salaries. The banana companies, taking advantage of the crisis in neighboring countries, specially in Nicaragua, lowered the salaries and reduced the few non-salary sources of income the Costa Rican workers enjoyed up to 1985. From then on the companies began to implement policies of subcontracting labor, the suspension of minimum wages (with the suppression of the Collective Conventions) and the destruction of labor stability. The population of workers on the banana plantations is estimated at 80,000 men and women workers, of which around 15,000 have permanent work, while the rest must compete for 35,000 temporary positions, wandering from plantation to plantation in search of work (as long as they are not on the computerized black lists for having rebelled against some injustice or for having a pro-union inclination, in which case they are not employed at all).The Social Cost of Ex-pansion Only 30 percent of the banana workers have stable employment. The remaining 70 percent must roam the region. The companies argue that all this is legal, as they apply the three month trial period of hiring workers without having any further responsibilities to the workers. But the companies avoid union organizing of workers, and in the case of illegal migrants, they refuse to pay them other workers’ rights such as the required year end gratuity, vacation payment, and social security. This occurs especially if the contact has been made between the company and an unscrupulous contractor. Since 1990 the salaries of the banana workers have not gone beyond an average of 250 dollars a month, a relatively higher wage than that earned in other agricultural activities, but one that does not pay the physical deterioration of the workers and the elevated cost of living. A banana worker has a useful life of some 15 years for the company. After that, the system ex-pels the worker who is no longer hired after the age of 40. Despite the fact that Costa Rica is a nation based on laws and one with a democratic tradition, workers’ rights are systematically violated on the banana plantations. This has been denounced before the ILO, specifically for violation of International Conventions 87 and 92, signed and ratified by the Costa Rican State. The employers, however, do not obey the sentences; they prefer, instead, to pay the stipulated fines. The small farmers who had land around the plantations were pressured to sell their land to the companies and emigrate or join the plantations as cheap hired labor. This situation was aggravated by State entities such as the Institute of Agrarian Development (IDA), which advised the small farmers that their property rights would be rescinded if they did not incorporate themselves into the banana plantation complex. The State began to destine its best resources to favor the Plan for Banana Development, in detriment of other agricultural activities, and especially of small farmers. The State eliminated credit for small farmers and suspended its technical support for marketing. In numerous occasions, the banana companies even obtained the technical permits from State employees to cut down trees (that prevent aerial fumigation) and traditional banana plants that could be carriers of the banana disease "sigatoka" or o-thers, on the land of small farmers. After 1989 a process of land concentration began. The land under banana cultivation went from 3500 hectares to more than 5000 hectares in only three years. This is a grave turn around regarding land distribution, where the best lands now went to cultivate a monoculture for exportation. The profits of this expansion benefited the transnational companies almost exclusively, there being very few banana producers of national capi-tal. Moreover, about 75 percent of the profits continue to remain in the hands of the exporters.The Attitude of the Church The Church, by way of the then Vicarage of Limon (today Diocese), pastored by Mons. Alfonso Coto Monge, along with the Clergy, carried out a socioeconomic and pastoral diagnostic at the end of the 1980s. To conclude, they decided to publish a Pastoral Letter "On the Uncontrolled Expansion of the Banana Industry". This document, published on the 25th of December of 1989, do-cumented the crude reality of the nega-tive impacts the banana industry had and its implication on social life, the environment and on the pastorate activities in the region. The Letter recalled that initially (in 1985) there was talk about expanding by 8000 hectares the area dedicated to banana production, but in three years the area expanded by 21,000 hectares. The document warned about the consequences of this unplanned expansion, expressing its opinion about what was occurring in the following areas:* The dignity of Men and Women* Family Life* Economic Policies* Land Tenure* Labor* Culture* Environmental Health and Ecological Unbalances* Pastorate Activities The document, prophetic in its warnings and courageous in its denunciations, was rejected by the business sector, the government and the officialist press that kept up a cons-tant attack for almost a semester against the Bishop and his priests, for involving themselves in social and economic issues, instead of religious ones. However, it was received as "good news" by a wide gamma of grass roots sectors, including labor and the environmental sectors of our socie-ty. This was a novel occurrence, since in previous years, the only voice ever heard was that of the banana business sector and the Solidarista Associations. The text of the Pastoral Letter also warned against being fooled by the pseudo-Christian message presented by Solidarismo: "We must point out that the work of labor promotion carried out by the Social School Juan XXIII (Promoter of Solidarismo), is not linked to the pastorate work carried out by the Apostolic Vicarage of Limon, accor-ding to its Global Plan, and therefore its task does not have in this particular Church an ecclesiastic character." This warning is important, as the Social School Juan XXIII has been the instrument, par excellence, for the disarticulation of labor unions. In the same document, the Church defends the rights denied to banana workers, both from a Christian perspective, as well as from a legal one. It demands "(...) employment stability, payments due to the workers, minimum wages, the required rest periods, the permanent and systematic formation of worker organizations, the freedom to organize independent of ideological and political interests, a just salary, the right to strike within the proper limits, good working conditions, and the integrated promotion of the family and the community in the areas of culture, religion and social communal services." With respect to the concentration of land, the Bishop states: "Sadly, we are witness to how, little by little, the small landowners begin to disappear, and suffer diverse forms of pressure which force them to enter the Plan of Banana Development, under the pretext that their lands are (apt for) this crop (...)". In regard to the environment, the priests, along with the Bishop, state: "We would like to point out the gravity of the growing deforestation, contamination of rivers, the accumulation of inorganic residues and agrochemicals which are causing infections, an increase in digestive and skin diseases caused by fumigation and the use of toxic chemicals, and the negative effects this has on some animal species in danger of extinction." After analyzing this document, various organizations began to prepare a dialogue with the authors. The Church represented a moral reserve and an authoratative voice that commented on social issues that affected the common good, specially the condition of the poorest sectors. The words of simple and humble people who had been silenced for fear of losing their jobs, or who had not received a response to their complaints, were an inspiration to grass roots organizations involved in these matters and to others that subsequen-tly became interested.The Foro Emaus is Born The onslaught of attacks coming from Solidarismo, the mass media, and the propaganda of the business sector, incited numerous organizations to come together, among them, labor, environmental, small farmer, ecclesiastical, indigenous, and communal organizations, to discuss among themselves and with the Church of Limon, the need to articulate efforts in order to form a united front against the problems caused by the Uncontrolled Expansion of the Banana Industry. In this spirit of democratic cooperation, a large number of grass roots leaders from different corners of the Atlantic region and from the rest of the country, converged to discuss these issues at the Casa Emaus a center for pastoral training located on the sea shore, near the center of the city of Limon. Many non-governmental organizations arrived, including environmental associations, Christian, labor, small farmer, and human rights organizations. With this coming together of leaders of grass roots organizations and the ecclesiastic leadership, the Foro Emaus was born. After various encounters, the result was a proposal of concerted action, with a commitment to mobilize before the authorities and become the interlocutor between governmental authorities, the business sector, and national and international public opinion. With the constitution of the Foro Emaus, the socioeconomic and environmental problems caused by the banana industry began to be studied from an integrated perspective, as was suggested in the Pastoral Letter. Thus emerged a grass roots proposal to halt the irrational banana industry, by way of organized and concerted action, and to fight for a just and environmentally sustainable form of banana production. After deliberations carried out the 13th and 14th of June of 1992, the Foro emmited a communique entitled "Stop the Uncontrolled Expansion of the Banana Industry", where it agreed on the need to carry out public denunciations. This materialized in the "March in Favor of Life and Human Rights" which took place on September 2nd of that same year, in the streets of San Jose, calling to stop the social and environmental disasters in Limon and Sarapiqui. More than 2500 people marched through the streets of the capital to demonstrate to the national and international public opinion (citizenry and the press) the grave conditions on the banana plantations and in the towns of the Caribbean Coast of Costa Rica. The event included a dialogue with the representatives of the diffe-rent parliamentarian factions of the Legislative Assembly and of the national government, to whom proposed laws and alternative solutions were presented. The number of messages, posters, banners, flyers, and the creativity demonstrated by the participants from the Atlantic Region, as well as the people from the Capital who attended in solidarity, contributed to consolidate the idea that the Foro Emaus was a viable and a necessary space to fight for the interests of the grass roots sectors, in a spirit of openness, democracy and ecumenism. But above all, it was the conviction expressed by those affected, for the need to continue fighting, and take advantage of the generous expresiones of solidarity of the Costa Rican people, the aperture achieved in the press, and the demostration of support of some political and business sectors, that made changes seem possible, and that there was hope for justice despite the power of adversaries.From 1992 to date With the expansion of the area dedicated to banana production (today at 54,000 hectares), the pro-blems denounced at the start of the "Uncontrolled Expansion of the Banana Industry", persisted after 1992, and new problems were aggravated despite the policies of fixing quotas by the European Union, the pretensions of the transnational companies to increase the export quotas every year continued. Meanwhile, new data from academic and research institutes appeared confirming the gravity of the environmental damage caused by the banana industry, as well as problems in the area of labor health. The banana companies, both national and transnational, carried out urgent publicity strategies to try to convince the consumers that they were incorporating the best technological advances to deal with the environmental demands of the international community. For this reason, it was imperative to fight to unmask this fraudulent ideo-logical strategy. The same could be said regarding the internal legal maneuvers that sought to stimulate the over exploitation of workers with new ideas about labor relations, such as "exce-llence and total quality" which in practical terms was (and is) an intensification of the use of labor with psycho-labor techniques involving individual competition, which result in more work, lower salaries, and worker division. The causes that motivated the creation of the Foro Emaus, continued and became worse, with the aggrava-ted situation on the banana plantations and in the communities. This required the intensification of the work of the Foro Emaus, in its educative, organizational efforts with the workers, the communities and the organizations involved. Since then the Foro Emaus has attempted to have the organizations participate actively in the process of denunciations and proposals. More than the sum of its parts, the Foro Emaus is a space of coordination which seeks the consensus of preoccupations and initiatives, and where the sum of the forces may advance the struggles of the poor and the rights of the communities. As a result of that collective will, the Foro Emaus has distributed duties and responsibilities in the Foro Emaus, in different commissions created to undertake the work based on the real needs of the population. The Foro Emaus has an Executive Secretary and a Coordinating Committee elected annually, with the responsibility to coordinate the execution of actions of the Foro Emaus. The Assembly of the Foro Emaus is made up of delegates of the more than 35 organizations that carry out work in different areas of the Atlantic Region. The members with full rights are organizations such as the banana workers unions, small farmer organizations, indigenous associations, ecological institutions, historical churches, NGOs dedicated to organic farming, labor education, and national labor unions with regional presence. The headquarters of the Foro Emaus is in the city of Siquirres, at an equidistant point from the most important urban centers of the Costa Rican Atlantic Region.

 

THE STRUGGLES ON THE BANANA PLANTATIONS IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE AS SEEN BY "CALUFA"

The United Fruit Company, that has always known very well how to defend its great interests in Costa Rica (and for which it has always counted on our lackey government leaders and the shameful and unpatriotic servile complicity of our periodic bourgeois press and that of almost all the newspaper reporters of the country), had organized its production in the Atlantic in a very singular manner. Its policy was to crea-te large private farmers, national landlords. It would rent land to them, financing their activity with money down; and if they already had land, it simply supplied the money needed to establish a banana plantation. But in any case, forcing them to sign leonine contracts written up by the lawyers of the Company, and in which the private farmers were bound to sell their bananas exclusively to the United Fruit Company at extremely low prices, calculated per banana bunch received (take note: received), minus a percen-tage for payment of the debt. Thus emerged in the Atlantic region hundreds of private plantations, ranging form large haciendas, to small farms.Carlos Luis Fallas, Mamita Yunai