On 12th November 1928, a large number of workers for the american 'United Fruit Company' on the carribean coast of Colombia began a strike, demanding reasonable working conditions. There was no negotiation from United Fruit. As weeks went by the company decided to try and break the strike by force, sending in a couple of hundred private soldiers who occupied the local town hall and attempted to establish martial law in the region. The Columbian government began the dispute as neutral observers but the US government increasingly put pressure on them to stop the strike, especially once the private soldiers were in place - as they were American citizens. As a result the Columbian government sent a regiment of the Columbian army to the 'Banana Zone' - but not local troops who might have sympathies with the strikers - they deliberately chose a regiment from the other side of the country.

Things came to a head on the night of 5/6 December. A crowd of several thousand protestors were gathered in the town square of Cienaga and remained there all night despite instructions from the army to disperse. There were definitely socialists in the mix but as much of the feeling was nationalist - against the foreign United Fruit Company as much as against the Columbian government. Eventually the army decided to issue a five minute warning to leave the square or be fired upon. When the protestors predictably remained, the army carried out their irresponsible threat and opened fire on the crowd.

The protestors fled the square and the whole region, as they were then hunted down. Some of their bodies were quickly buried to hide the scale of the massacre. As a result it is hard to accurately count the number who were killed. However, a Dispatch from U.S. Bogotá Embassy to the US Secretary of State, dated January 16, 1929, stated:
"I have the honor to report that the Bogotá representative of the United Fruit Company told me yesterday that the total number of strikers killed by the Colombian military exceeded 1000."
This wasn't leftist propaganda inflating the figures. This was the US government reporting as good news a high number of casualties. Even if they or United Fruit were inflating the figure, what shocks me is that they wanted the figure to be high.

The United Fruit Company is now called Chiquita, and I've seen their stickers on my bananas. But now I've learnt that in recent years they have been funding terrorist organisations in Columbia in order to make it easier to do business there, and have been implicated in depriving their workers of basic human rights (including by threatening them with private militia). This is not just a lesson from history, it's happening now. And it is no doubt happening in the supply chains of many many of the products we consume. Which is why I'm pretty ambivalent about 'Vegan', 'Organic', 'Sustainable palm oil', 'Rainforest alliance', or 'Free range' - but I'm still buying 'Fair trade' whenever I can even though it's yesterday's popular cause.

More than that, this story tells me that even with all the best will in the world, and hours I don't have dedicated to ensuring the maximum ethical-ness of all my purchases - I'm still going to end up funding injustice somewhere along the line. That doesn't mean I don't bother - it means I have to do more. I can't just look on at injustice in Columbian banana plantations and say, 'well at least that's nothing to do with me'. I have to say, 'I'm at least a small part of the problem, how can I help also be part of the solution?' What can I invest in communities like that as well as inevitably taking something away?

And with my financial giving and writing to my MP and prayer, have I covered my debts to banana workers in Columbia? I don't think there is any way for me to know. This could make me feel guilty, fatalistic, paralysed into inaction or numbing myself with pleasure to ignore it or even nagging everyone else to share my guilt. Mercifully I have been introduced to a grace that says yes, you are guilty, but your debt has been paid.

To read more on the Banana Massacre:
www.scielo.org.co/scielo.php?script=sci_arttext&pid=S1794-88862012000300003&lng=en&nrm=iso&tlng=en

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bananas Massacre

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chiquita_Brands_International (see criticism section)