Colombia: sugar cane industry.

Thirteen sugar cane plantations employ 30,000 workers in Colombia without contracts. The state controls production, favouring large corporations, particularly those connected to sugar cane production. Paramilitary groups assassinated around 4000 union workers in recent years. Plan Colombia and the World Bank have established special programs for palm oil production which is exempt from taxes. The US wants to increase ethanol production and other agrofuels to help solve its energy crisis, while purchasing low-cost petroleum from Colombia.

Industrialization in Colombia began in the first decades of the 20th century. Fast expansion of the sugar cane market led to industrial plantations being setup. Plantations arose like Riopalia of the Caicedo family, Providencia of the Cabal family, and Mayaguez of the Hurtado Holguin family, which continue to be Columbia's main sugar cane producers. From 1946 to 1958 two million people were forcibly removed from the land losing 350,000 properties in the period known as 'La Violencia'. Plantations greatly expanded in Valle del Cauca province leading to stronger control of Colombia's sugar cane market Valle del Cauca was the province with the largest number of forcibly removed families.

Ardila Lulle, the conglomerate, is now one of Colombia's largest sugar cane producers. Its origins are in the soda industry it monopolized so that now only Coca-Cola can compete with the company as Lulle bought out Colombia's Pepsi Co. subsidiary. Ardila Lulle also owns textile companies and the radio and television company RCN, one of two media companies controlling Colombian communications. The company fully owns the Cauca sugar cane plantation, 52% of the Providencia plantation, and 350 of the Risaralda plantation, founded in 1979 with investment from the Coffee Growers' Foundation, the Colombian state, and the Western Financial Corporation, dominated by Citibank.

Ardila Lulle is the main promoter of ethanol production in Colombia. Its Cauca, Providencia, and Risaralda plantations produce 65% of all Colombian sugar-based ethanol, while the Manuelita and Mayaguez plantations produce the remaining 20% and 15% respectively. Ethanol production in Colombia is the result of the large potential for 'bureaucratic capitalism' to manoeuvre in the country. This form of capitalism, according to Hector Mondragon, consolidated in Colombia in the middle of the 20th Century and is characterised by direct state control of production, favouring large corporations, particularly those connected to sugar cane production.

Law 693, passed 19 September 2001, determines that, starting in September 2006, gasoline in Colombian cities larger than 500,000 inhabitants must be mixed with ethanol. Ethanol production costs are higher than gasoline costs, and despite ecological and social concerns, the law was imposed allowing Ardila Lulle to profit from ethanol's price at US$2.40 a gallon, much more profitable than gasoline at US$1.26 a gallon, produced by Ecopetrol, the state oil company (Serrani, 2007). Law 788 in 2002 exonerated ethanol producers from state and fuel taxes, incentives costing the state US$100 million yearly. The government's program of 'oxygenated gasoline', promoting gasoline with a 10% ethanol mix, began in November 2005 in the Southwest and in the coffee-growers' zone, and in February 2006 in Bogota.

How can Ardila Lulle and other large sugar cane corporations impose these kinds of mega-profits? The company has strong ties with the state and supported the elections of Pastrana and Uribe, as well as Congress members. Ardila Lulle has strong media influence, owning RCN, the radio and television company, which of recent years, has been publicly apologetic for paramilitary groups assassinating around 4000 union workers, while controlling extensive land areas.

The US wants to increase ethanol production and other agrofuels to help solve its energy crisis, while purchasing low-cost petroleum from Colombia. It's useful to the US for Colombia to consume agroenergy, costing more than gasoline, allowing a larger quantity of Colombian petroleum to be exported to the US more cheaply.

Workers conditions

Thirteen sugar cane plantations employ 30,000 workers without contracts. Formerly strong unions have been reduced to minimal strength. Contracts are forged by so-called 'cooperatives; created to conceal labor relations in plantations. Yet the sugar cane 'cooperatives' began to strike in 2003, when 1600 operators shut down La Cabana plantation. More recently, in May 2005, over 2700 sugar cane cutters from the Cauca plantation stopped work Later another 7000 workers went on strike at Mayaguez, Manuelita, and other plantations. Lack of worker regulations prevented the authorities from calling the strikes illegal, and the 'cooperatives' design was used against its inventors. But work conditions for sugar cane cutters continue in chaos. Edison Arturo Sanchez, organizer of the Castilla strike was assassinated. At the La Cabana plantation agreements reached on working conditions were completely ignored and the strikers were dismissed.

Palm oil's sad history and future

Palm oil was originally produced in Colombia by large landowners taking advantage of land they confiscated in regions like Magdalena Medio after peasants were displaced from 1946 to 1958, in the time of La Violencia. Palm companies, the largest being Indupalma of the Gutt family, imposed super-exploitation of workers. Unions did achieve some rights for workers, but repression was the response to workers organizations, with criminalization of strikes, and violence against union leaders. This repression weakened unions, and large numbers of workers left to form 'cooperative associations', established to conceal labor relations.

Palm oil companies prefer to cultivate lands owned by others, which externalises land degradation costs and allows companies to avoid taxes and establish supposed 'strategic alliances' or 'productive associations' with peasants and indigenous peoples who hand over their lands. As well as giving up their lands, the smallholders also 'offer' their labor as so-called 'business partners; of the palm oil companies but with no working contract. These companies created an exceptional situation for themselves, allowing them to evade land and tax costs, to substantially reduce wages and eliminate social costs. Meanwhile, society pays the environmental costs of palm exploitation, while companies amass profits.

Transnational corporations in the vegetable oil industry, like Unilever, benefit most from stimulating growth of palm oil plantations in the tropical world. Starting in Malaysia and Indonesia, they grew and expanded into Cameroon, Nigeria, other African countries, Central America, and South America. Expansion tends to lower palm oil's price on the international market, benefitting corporations using it in their products. More recently, as palm oil's price declined, the great increase in petroleum costs stimulated a new expansion of palm oil plantations for agrodiesel production. Agrodiesel is promoted as one of the most extraordinary markets in history, guaranteeing magnificent ecological impacts for the world. Yet, for citizens in producing countries and regions, its effects may be devastating. Tropical forests and native vegetation will be destroyed, reducing biodiversity; soils will be degraded as palm plantations continue their productive cycles using chemical inputs. Food sovereignty will be in danger as plantations expand, replacing food production for fuel production, most of which will be exported.

Palm oil legislation establishes it must be exempt from taxes. Plan Colombia and the World Bank have established special programs for palm oil production. State laws currently in progress envisage subsidies and state investments in the industry.

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