Failed wage negotiations on Western Cape farms could see workers across the food and allied industries down tools this week in support of a demand for a R150 minimum daily wage for farmworkers.
A coalition of labour – comprising Cosatu, the Food and Allied Workers Union (Fawu) and the Commercial Stevedoring Agricultural & Allied Workers Union (CSAAWU) – and civic organisations has vowed to facilitate the resumption of the strike on Wednesday.
The two key demands are the R150 a day minimum wage for all farmworkers and ownership of land by farm dwellers.
Fawu has threatened to call on all its affiliates in the food and hospitality sectors to join in solidarity if the farmers’ association, Agri SA, does not agree to negotiate today.
The three parties, Agri SA, the government and the farmworkers’ unions, are expected to hold a feedback session in Cape Town today where reasons for the failure of wage negotiations will be scrutinised.
“We are willing to discuss with the farmers so [that] we can find a way forward… But right now we have no partner to negotiate with,” said Sandile Keni of Fawu. “If we need to make a call that every industry under Fawu supports the strike, we will do so.”
The government and Cosatu facilitated a halt to the farmworkers’ strike late last year with an understanding that unions would negotiate with farmers farm by farm.
However, Cosatu’s Western Cape regional secretary, Tony Ehrenreich, said there had been no progress on the negotiations and now the federation wanted to call on the international community, including structures like Fair Trade, to boycott produce from farmers with “unfair labour practices”.
CSAAWU said the international boycott was also called to protest against the “economic boycott” perpetrated by farmers on farmworkers who were involved in the strike.
“
Workers were without food during the festive season,” said Karel Swart, the assistant secretary-general of CSAAWU.
Keni said some workers had still not been reinstated to their jobs since the strike was halted.
Elize van der Westhuizen, the human resources manager at Agri SA, said forcing farmers to negotiate a minimum daily wage of R150 was a recipe for massive lay-offs.
“One has to look at what’s affordable and what’s not; R150 a day is not affordable for any industry in the agricultural sector at this stage,” she said.
When the protests broke out on Western Cape farms in November last year, Agri SA commissioned research on what wage was affordable in the agricultural sector. The results of this research would form the basis of the decision on what comprised a fair and sustainable daily wage for a farmworker.
Van der Westhuizen said the research results were handed to Agri SA last week but the association had yet to study the report and would do so when work resumed today.
She said Agri SA had yet to quantify how the Western Cape farm strikes had affected harvests and exports as the strike had happened during the harvesting season. The Western Cape farms are a key producing area for stone fruit, grapes and other fruit for export and domestic consumption.