29 October 2012

A fortnight ago, Kenyan trade union leader Francis Atwoli was fined 500,000 Shillings (that’s about £3,000) because he refused to call off a strike (two years earlier!) defending jobs in the Kenyan tea industry from mechanisation. He was confined to the cells until his union came up with the cash. The details of the strike [...]

29 October 2012

  Mbide Charles Kude, General Secretary of the Fako Agricultural Workers Union (FAWU) in Cameroon, visited the UK last as part of the Europe wide Make Fruit Fair campaign. We were fortunate enough to catch up with him and hear about conditions faced by workers on banana plantations in Cameroon, and how campaigners and activists in [...]

10 August 2012

Africa is booming, and it’s largely due to Chinese investment. China has been trading with Africa for centuries, but there is a new intensity to trade and investment. While much of the rest of the world suffers deep recession, African raw materials are flooding into Chinese factories, and China is building infrastructure across the continent. China [...]

17 May 2012

Banana Link is working in partnership with the Fako Agricultural Workers Union (FAWU), which organises plantation workers in the South West Province of Cameroon, to develop a project to educate and empower banana workers and their union. As investment increases in export production in Central and West Africa, Banana Link is strengthening relationships with African [...]

1 May 2012

BY Jacqui Mackay from Banana Link The Make Fruit Fair campaign, coordinated by Peuples Solidaires (France), BanaFair (Germany), Nazemi (Czech Republic) and Banana Link (UK), has launched a petition calling on the European Union to ‘Stop supermarkets abusing their buyer power’. More than 5000 people have signed – add your name today here and help [...]

30 April 2012

BY Paul Opanga It is few months before heads of state gather again in Brazil in June 2012 to resolve to work together for a prosperous, secure and sustainable future for the people and the planet. The Rio +20 Meeting under theme “the future we want” has recognised critical issues that include jobs, energy, cities, [...]

30 April 2012

BY Aisha Bahadur It is in the interest of the developed world to keep Africa poor. Resources of the continent are exported to continue building development in industrialised nations.  Africa has been blocked from colonial times by the developed world from making strategic use of these resources for its own development, hence the weak industrial [...]