ROW OVER WHARF MECHANISATION IN JAMAICA by Dick Skyers
Although the level of wages in Jamaica is very low and the rate of unemployment very high (the figure has never been published because of government ombarrassment) the agricultural industrialists are determined to extract even more profits from an already underemployed and starving people. A typical example is the determination of the industrialists to introduce mechanisation in the wharfs. They argue that failure to mechanise would render export crops uncompetitive in world markets.
That this is absolute nonsense goes without saying, ‘Then one looks at the trading surpluses of Tate & Lyle, the Jamaica sugar barons, one gets all the proof one needs. But the determination to mechanise does not lie only with the sugar baronss the United Fruit Company and the Jamaican Banana Producers Assoc. are determined to extract more profits by doing away with as much of the labour force as possible,
Whilst the sugar industry's profits could be swelled considerably by mechanisation it remains somewhat difficult to see how this could be done in the banana industry, since suitable mechanical handling could only take place at wharfs, In addition, the labour force cmployed in loading bananas is very small, varying $twoen two and three thousand workers. They work a 24-hour day on the wharfs, once a week, and for this they are paid £2.10s
The Prime Minister, Mr, Bustamente, in refusing to allow mcchanisation, says the employers' arguments are nonsense. What he did not say was that what is needed is land reform, and that the banana exporting industry should be nationalised. Perhaps this is not surprising - he has a big stake in the industry: he is the ormer of very large banana plantations.