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Liberia: Firestone Challenge Advances
AfricaFocus Bulletin
Jan 17, 2008 (080117)
(Reposted from sources cited below)
Editor's Note
Workers at the Firestone Rubber Plantation in Liberia have for the
first time won representation under a free union vote, throwing out
the officials of a company-controlled union. The vote took place in
July last year, but it took two court decisions and an unauthorized
strike before officials finally agreed to negotiate with the new
union and hand over their company-collected union dues. The union
recognition is only a first step, however, in changing a system of
brutal exploitation of child labor and virtual bondage for the
rubber tappers.
The Stop Firestone Campaign, joining Liberian and international
non-governmental organizations, is supporting a law suit filed
against Firestone by the International Labor Rights Fund on behalf
of former child laborers and their children. Firestone and the
newly-elected leadership of the Firestone Agricultural Workers
Union of Liberia (FAWUL) met for the first time on January 10, at
the initiative of human rights activist Samuel Kofi Woods, who has
been Liberian Minister of Labor since February 2006. Wood expressed
the hope that the meeting signaled a new willingness to find ways
to improve the conditions of workers at the plantation.
This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains a news release from the AFLCIO
blog on the Liberian court decision, and a background article
written in December by free-lance writer Jamie Menutis.
For earlier AfricaFocus Bulletins on Liberia, see
http://www.africafocus.org/country/liberia.php
Among other resources for background information and references
The Stop Firestone Campaign
http://www.stopfirestone.org
"Stopping Firestone: Getting Rubber to Meet the Road"
Foreign Policy in Focus Commentary by Roxanne Lawson and Tim
Newman, Dec. 7, 2006
http://www.fpif.org/fpiftxt/3766
"Modern Slavery in Liberia"
Pambazuka News commentary by Robtel Neajai Pailey
Feb. 2, 2006
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/comment/31756
Pambazuka Podcast: Liberian human rights activists Samuel Kofi
Woods, now Minister of Labor, and Ezekiel Pajibo, director of the
Center for Democratic Empowerment (CEDE), discuss the past and
present of Firestone in Liberia, April 26, 2007
http://www.pambazuka.org/en/category/podcasts/41098
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
Update to AfricaFocus Bulletin on "Talking about 'Tribe'"
(http://www.africafocus.org/docs08/ethn0801.php).
Since that Bulletin was written last week, New York Times reporting on Kenya,
cited there, has avoided the indiscriminate use of the word tribe
in favor of "ethnic group," and has stressed the historical origins
and political character of the continued violence in the country as
well as its links to ethnic divisions. Thanks to those AfricaFocus
readers and others who contacted the New York Times about its
coverage.
And many thanks to those of you who have recently sent in a
voluntary subscription payment to support AfricaFocus Bulletin. If
you haven't yet sent in such a payment and are able to do so,
please help AfricaFocus reach more people with reliable information
on Africa. Go to http://www.africafocus.org/support.php, and send
in a check or pay on-line using Paypal or Google Checkout.
++++++++++++++++++++++end editor's note+++++++++++++++++++++++
Liberia's Firestone Rubber Workers Win a Union Voice
Posted By Mike Hall On January 6, 2008 In Corporate Greed,
Organizing & Bargaining
AFL-CIO Weblog - http://blog.aflcio.org -
For the first time in 81 years, the more than 4,000 workers at a
Bridgestone Firestone-owned rubber plantation in Liberia now are in
control of their own union. In late December, the Liberian Supreme
Court ruled the July election that threw out the officials of the
longtime company-controlled union was a legitimate election.
International election observers, including the United Steelworkers
(USW) and the AFL-CIO's Solidarity Center, certified the election
but a small group of officials from the discredited company union
challenged the results.
While the case was before the court, Firestone refused to bargain
with the union, and on Dec. 6, the workers staged a strike
demanding recognition of their union. Austin Nantee, the newly
elected president of the Firestone Agricultural Workers Union of
Liberia (FAWUL), says: "The Firestone workers are jubilant and are
steadfast in their commitment. The workers themselves have realized
their power and are looking forward to carving out a new collective
bargaining agreement with the company."
Says USW President Leo Gerard: "This ruling is a landmark victory
for democratic and independent unions and provides Firestone
workers with an opportunity to bargain with management to obtain
much-needed improvements in wages, health care, safety and
educational opportunities. The USW calls on Firestone to accept the
results of the election and to begin the process of working with
the union to achieve a fair agreement that rewards and respects the
work of Liberian rubber workers."
The USW, which represents Bridgestone Firestone workers in the
United States, has supported the Liberian workers for the past two
years through training programs, workshops and education in
partnership with the Solidarity Center.
The USW and the Solidarity Center found horrid living conditions on
the plantation. Workers at the plantation earn a little more than
$3 a day, and then only if they meet a burdensome quota. Workers
are forced to carry heavy loads of rubber in metal pails on their
backs and walk for miles to weighing stations. They live in shacks
with no electricity, no running water or sanitary bathroom
facilities. Their children have no access to a high school
education.
Firestone Rubber & Latex Company: Prospering from Child Labor and
Enslavement in Liberia
by Jamie Menutis
December 4, 2007
Jamie Menutis is a freelance journalist based in New Orleans and
the author of "Where the Natives Feast in New Orleans," She
documented human rights abuses against Liberians in West Africa for
the US Refugee Resettlement Office/US Department of State in
Freetown, Sierra Leone during the 90's. She contributed this
article to Media Monitors Network (MMN).
http://usa.mediamonitors.net/content/view/full/48027
"On the Firestone Plantation, children are forced to walk several
miles carrying 70 pound load pails of tapped latex on their
shoulders supported by sticks. The heavy loads form blisters on
their skin and often result in long term back and neck injuries.
Rubber latex causes permanent eye damage and all workers, including
children, are not provided with safety materials such as gloves or
glasses."
For children and workers at the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company
in Harbel, Liberia, West Africa, $3.19 a day means you've fulfilled
your day's quota of tapping 650 rubber trees. Workers that fail to
"tap" all 650 trees, agree to have their daily wages cut in half to
$1.59. This is the reason why Firestone management admits to
turning a blind eye when workers bring their children to work aside
them as they toil to meet their daily set quota. The work is long
and hard and the quotas are unreasonable. But according to Dan
MacDonald, director of media relations for Bridgestone-Firestone,
"Most tappers work seven to eight hour day," and "The daily quota
is enough for a living wage." Additionally, Firestone's Company
President, Mr. Dan Adomitis says, "Each tapper will tap about 650
trees a day where they spend perhaps a couple of minutes at each
tree." Of course, 650 trees, at two minutes per tree, ends up
totaling to 1,300 minutes or 21 hours a day of work. Did I forget
to mention that each tree must be visited twice? This is where the
children come in - the average child can work many long hours on
the Plantation and be of great assistance to their parents in
meeting those quotas. They must, or else their family won't earn
enough to survive.
Firestone operates one of the world's largest rubber plantations
and rubber is Liberia's number one export. America is its number
one importer, we make tires out of their tapped African rubber, and
lots of them. Firestone has operated in Liberia for the past 81
years and not much has changed, except maybe the wages. Back in
1926, Firestone paid its workers 24 cents a day, an amount equal to
roughly $9.19 a day in 2004. This rate is calculated on the basis
of the unskilled wage rate of comparison. Today, in 2007, tappers
earn $3.19 a day, a rate that calculates to a loss of $6.00 against
that of their predecessors. In short, tappers are producing more,
working harder, and earning less as time goes on.
[Unskilled wage rate calculations taken from article by Carl
Patrick Burrowes (http://www.stopfirestone.org/history.htm)]
The magic number of 650 trees per day was stated by Mr. Adomitis
on CNN in an interview back in 1995. It was later explained as "A
figure of speech" by Firestone Public Relations. But it did not get
past the eyes of human rights groups who have long claimed
indentured servitude and exploitation of children exists on the
Firestone Rubber & Latex Plantation in Liberia. According to a May
2006 report by the United Nations Mission in Liberia, (UNMIL) grave
human rights violations exist at the Firestone Plantation in
Liberia. Firestone admits that it does not monitor its own policy
prohibiting child labor and the report found several factors
contributing to the use of children in rubber tapping including
pressure to meet unrealistic company quotas, lack of access to
basic education and the need to support the family financially.
On the Firestone Plantation, children are forced to walk several
miles carrying 70 pound load pails of tapped latex on their
shoulders supported by sticks. The heavy loads form blisters on
their skin and often result in long term back and neck injuries.
Rubber latex causes permanent eye damage and all workers, including
children, are not provided with safety materials such as gloves or
glasses. Additionally, toxic pesticides are used and applied to the
trees and used in the production process. Children apply these
pesticides with their bare hands. Blindness is not uncommon with
some long term workers on the plantation due to the prolonged
exposure. All of these factors pose unacceptable health risks and
signal a need for major reform.
In case, you didn't know, extracting rubber from trees is done by
crude methods, tappers use sharp knives to cut into the trees to
expose the sap. The use of modern tools to help with extracting in
a safer manner is not used on the Plantation and both children and
adults risk injury in the primitive tapping processes that are
applied.
Generations of families have lived and worked at the Firestone
Plantation. Until recently, not a single new home was built apart
from the original 1926 shacks. The workers merely existed in
shambles. Due to recent press about the conditions at the Firestone
Plantation, the company has erected some new housing near its main
road entrance for all to see. The new houses, however, do not have
running water, electricity or latrines. For senior Firestone
management though, it is a different story. Managerial staff live
on the plantation, but more like plantation masters, their homes
surrounded by manicured gardens, with golf course access and all
the amenities one would expect masters to have, such as running
water, electricity and even a toilet. Many of the American and
Asian employees stay in these homes.
Also recent are Firestone's claims to have built more classrooms on
its property for children. Firestone runs its own schools and
health clinics on its acreage. Unfortunately, the clinics are only
open three days a week, and to attend the schools, a child must be
able to prove that they were born on the Firestone property by
providing a birth certificate issued and available from Firestone,
for a fee.
There are children who have never set foot off of the Firestone
Plantation and have lived in these deplorable conditions, breathing
in the toxic putrid smell of latex their entire lives. Poverty
allows them no other option. What options and/or obligations does
the billion-dollar plus, profit-making Firestone company have to
its employees and what is it willing to offer to the Liberian
people for partaking and profiting from its natural resources?
What, besides illness, poverty and exploitation is Firestone
willing to provide to the people of Liberia ? The use of children
as laborers on the rubber plantation is totally against
international laws including ILO Convention and American and
Liberian Labor laws, but until recently, nobody seemed to care.
Exploitation of child labor and human rights issues are only part
of Firestone's problems. It seems the chemical effluent or run-off,
is being dumping into nearby Farmington River and has virtually
killed off the entire river. The groundwater is contaminated and
"Local fishermen have lost all source of livelihood, herdsmen
cannot raise their cattle because animals drinking water from the
river die mysteriously, groundwater on the mainland is
contaminated, and the locals have abandoned all of the wells along
the river bank," Said Alfred Brownell, an Attorney for Green
Advocates, an environmental monitoring organization in Liberia. The
air pollution, a visible smoke mixture of chemicals and carbon
dioxide, is released and inhaled by inhabitants of nearby Harbel
town.In response to allegations of environmental damage by
Firestone, the company recently responded by presenting its own
environmental cleanup plan to the Liberian Environmental Protection
Agency. The plan, which has not been released to the public, was
rejected by the Liberian government and is at present, still in
negotiations. Firestone's press department further claimed
2005-2006 Firestone's "Environmentally Friendly Year." In 2007, it
won the Public Eye Global Award for being one of the worst
polluters.
The conditions at the Firestone Plantation are deplorable and it
has been this way since 1926 when American Harvey Firestone crafted
a sweet 99-year land lease deal for his newfound company that gave
Firestone one million acres of rich West African land blessed with
an over abundance of rubber trees at a mere 6 cents an acre. In
exchange, Liberia would accept a soft $5 million loan from the
American via one of his formed companies to help Liberia repay its
debt to the USA. The sweetheart deal promised a shared prosperity
that has never come to fruition, at least not in any real sense,
for the government of Liberia and its people. For Firestone,
however, operating in Liberia has meant lower costs, evasion of
taxes, and most of all, record profits.
In 2005, Liberia's transitional government signed another
concession agreement with Firestone for an extra 37 years. Despite
the fact that the transitional government may not have had
authority to broker such a deal, the revised agreement gave
Firestone an extension on its original lease and more time to
pursue its damaging course. The new government of President Ellen
Johnson-Sirleaf is reviewing the concession agreement and is in the
process of renegotiating many of its terms since many of the
agreements made by the transitional government did not give Liberia
an equitable share of the financial benefits that it is due.
Additionally, the agreement allowed Firestone to set the price of
rubber and thereby control its pricing and taxable income numbers.
A small share of tax on profits is all that Liberia is to receive.
Additionally, the Liberian government was left out of any equity
share in the investment, this despite the fact that rubber is
Liberia's number one export. Again, Firestone took advantage of
Liberia's post war vulnerability, to negotiate an extended
agreement beneficial to no one except itself. Firestone's African
land grab, plantation conditions, economic exploitation and human
rights abuses are happening today, by a multi-national corporation
owned by American and Japanese investors. This is not the work of
an overthrown colonial power of yesterday. This is modern day
slavery and exploitation and every single person who drives or buys
products made by Bridgestone/Firestone should be aware of the
conditions associated with the production of their products. As
consumers, we have a lot of say about how we want our products
produced and we can demand that Firestone treat its workers with
due dignity and respect. It must also continue reforms and set fair
quota standards for its workers. Children must not be used as
workers on its plantation.
At last, someone has stepped up and is ready to fight for the
children and exploited workers. The International Labor Rights Fund
filed an Alien Tort Claims Act case in the US District Court of
California against Bridgestone alleging "Forced labor, the modern
equivalent of slavery" on the Firestone Plantation in Harbel,
Liberia. According to the Lawsuit filed in 2005, on behalf of 35
Liberian child and former child laborers, who remain anonymous,
"The plantation workers allege, among other things, that they
remain trapped by poverty and coercion on a frozen-in-time
Plantation operated by Firestone in a manner identical to how the
Plantation was operated when it was first opened by Firestone in
1926," states the lawsuit. The plaintiffs grew up on the Plantation
and brought their case before a U.S. Court because Liberia's war
crippled legal system was unable to handle the case. In June 2007,
the judge in the lawsuit against Firestone ruled against
Firestone's motion to dismiss the case. As of today, the case is
moving forward on the child labor claims, but no status details are
available to the public.
To learn more about the case and take action against Firestone,
visit the Stop Firestone Campaign at http://www.stopfirestone.org
AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with
a particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.
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