I won’t go to China to defend my longboard world title this year because of its human rights record: we need a wave of change Surfing is a fringe sport with roots as a sacred activity of the Queens and Kings of the Hawaiian Islands. Olympic swimming gold medalist, Duke Kahanamoku , is credited with the popularisation of surfing as he travelled the world performing swimming exhibitions. He would paddle his 10ft redwood longboard out to the empty lineups of international beaches in front of curious crowds of onlookers, heave and twist his board toward shore, paddle gracefully into a wave and finally stand, erect and dignified on a virtual aircraft carrier of a surfboard. Surfing has come a long way since these days in the early 1900s. Our boards are shorter and they are made of industrial materials like polyurethane foam or epoxy, which makes them lighter and more performance-oriented. Where Duke stood in his dignity, surfers now carve under liquid curls, lacerate foam ball sections and throw themselves, looping madly, into the air above the waves. The sport has evolved to include surf competitions in the last three decades and a $6bn industry that continues to drive the sport forward. The foremost governing body of surfing, the ASP , and major surfing brands, such as Quiksilver , Billabong and Rip Curl , have made it possible for some surfers to create a career out of this activity. Of the two main branches of surfing – shortboarding and longboarding – longboarders have had the least opportunity to make a career out of surfing, despite being the closer of the two to the original roots of the sport. Female longboarders are even farther removed from this opportunity, as the newest addition to the ASP world tour. With this reality in focus, any opportunity handed down by the powers-that-be is generally accepted with gratitude by female longboarders. Not so with the offer of the ASP to make the deciding event of the Women’s World Longboard Championship of 2011, its first significant event in China … at least, not for this female longboarder. After receiving the email that notified me of the event in February, which would be subsidised by the Chinese government (including all airfares, accommodations and food for the surfers), I decided to use the platform I now have, as the current women’s world longboard champion, to boycott the tour in order to draw attention to a precedent being set in our industry. China, admittedly, has huge economic potential for many industries, but the human rights complexities of doing business there require an introspective assessment of what the surf industry’s motivations – along with its professional tour’s – are in going into China. Foreign businesses seeking to take advantage of China’s booming economy and its growing middle class have a moral duty and responsibility to actively participate in improving the socio-political environment of China’s citizens. This extends to sports as much as it does to other industries doing business in China. The surf industry and the ASP are taking cues from the sports and their respective tours that have gone before them – for example: basketball (NBA), golf (PGA tour) and soccer (Fifa). Sports industries, and their governing bodies, have a tremendous opportunity to effect systemic change through their business associations in China. So if their intention is simply to take advantage of the economic opportunities there, then it must be understood that they will be tacit partners of, and complicit with, those who enact violations of the universal human rights of Chinese citizens. It is my hope that those in my surfing community who feel similarly will voice their opinion. That way, we can foster a future where we are able to participate with a clear conscience, in China and elsewhere where human rights are violated, as true ambassadors of a sport that constructively seeks to protect and value the rights of all human beings. Surfing China Human rights Sport politics Ethics Cori Schumacher guardian.co.uk
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If Nato treated all human life as of equal value when paying compensation it would change the face of the Afghan conflict How many Afghan lives are worth one British life? We shrink at that question. If forced to answer, some reply: “All human life is of infinite value.” Others cite the Jewish teaching that if you put one human life on one side of a scale, and the rest of the world on the other side, the scale is balanced equally. Most just say that an Afghan life is worth the same as a British life, because all human lives are of equal value. Isn’t that what we all believe? The Ministry of Defence has been paying compensation to Afghans for accidentally killing their children, their brothers and sisters, or their parents, during the fighting in Afghanistan. Thanks to a freedom of information request from the Guardian, we know how much the MoD has paid families when a member has been killed . Here are some examples : daughter hit by shrapnel from air-strike and later died of injuries, $1,000; mother killed during bombing, $5,000; two brothers and two sons killed by hellfire missile strike, $32,000. The variation in the figures is not explained, but in no case was more than $8,000 (about £5,000), paid for the loss of a single life. Now let’s take a look at the value of a British life. The National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (Nice) assesses drugs and other medical treatments for cost-effectiveness and recommends whether they should be supplied on the National Health Service. Nice is commendably transparent. No freedom of information requests are needed. Just visit its website for a description of how it decides if a treatment is worth paying for. The key factual question is how much the treatment costs for each quality-adjusted life year , or QALY, gained. A QALY is one year of life of good quality, or its equivalent, which might be a longer period of life of lower quality. The website then tells you that while decisions are made on a case by case basis, “generally … if a treatment costs more than £20,000-30,000 per QALY, then it would not be considered cost effective”. Remember, that sum is per QALY, not per life saved. So if we take the bottom end of this range, Nice recommends that the NHS pay up to four times as much to extend the life of a British citizen by just one year, as the MoD is prepared to pay in compensation for killing a child or young person. That young person could – even allowing for Afghanistan’s dismal life expectancy – expect to live another 40 reasonably good-quality years. That suggests an answer to the question with which I started: it takes about 4 x 40, or 160 Afghan lives, to be worth the same as one British life. But that would not be the right answer, because £5,000 will buy much more in Afghanistan than it would buy in Britain – according to international price comparisons, perhaps four or five times as much. Let’s say five times. Even with that adjustment, it is going to take 32 Afghan lives to be worth the same as one British life. There is nothing unique about Britain in this respect. The Guardian has reported that the US generally pays no more than $2,500 in compensation for the loss of an Afghan life. In contrast, after the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001, the US government set up a Victim Compensation Fund . The average payment it made to families of victims was $1.8m. Adjusting for purchasing power at a 5:1 ratio suggest that the US regards the life of an American as equivalent to the lives of 144 Afghans. What would happen if the Nato forces really took seriously the idea of the equal value of all human life? They would then have to compensate Afghans for the civilian deaths and injuries they are causing at the same level as they would compensate their own citizens if, for example, a military exercise went wrong and killed people at home. That would serve three important purposes. First, it would demonstrate to the Afghans that the Nato forces truly respect them as equals. Second, the troops themselves might start to see Afghans as more like them, and have a new respect for the people they are trying to aid. Third, a dramatic increase in the costs of endangering the lives and limbs of civilians might foster a new restraint, because no military force wants to drain its own resources. The result would then be that fewer civilians would be killed – surely a very good thing, both for the civilians themselves, and for winning over the support of Afghans. Afghanistan Nato Defence policy Military Middle East US military United States Peter Singer guardian.co.uk
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Former prime minister says Libyan officials trying to negotiate with UK, France and US, as rebels outline ceasefire conditions The regime of Colonel Muammar Gaddafi has initiated a concerted effort to open lines of communication with western governments in an attempt to bring the conflict in the country to an end. As fighting continues in Libya, the country’s former prime minister Abdul Ati al-Obeidi told Channel 4 : “We are trying to talk to the British, the French and the Americans to stop the killing of people. We are trying to find a mutual solution.” Obeidi’s indication of the increased effort to make contact with western governments comes as opposition leaders in the rebels’ de facto capital of Benghazi laid out their own conditions for a ceasefire. The initiatives on both sides appear to reflect an emerging stalemate between the forces and a growing weariness of war. Obeidi’s comments followed his confirmation that a meeting had taken place between a senior aide to Gaddafi’s influential son Saif al-Islam and British officials on Wednesday in London, as revealed by the Guardian. Mohammed Ismail’s meeting with UK officials was also confirmed by a friend of his in Tripoli. Ismail is a key fixer in the Gaddafi regime who has been used by the Gaddafi family to negotiate arms deals and he has considerable contacts in the west. It has also emerged that British officials have been in contact with a number of Libyan officials, including Ismail, in recent weeks in behind-the-scenes diplomacy, according to a spokesman for the prime minister, David Cameron, who declined to give specific details. “We are sending them all one very clear message, which is that Gaddafi must go.” The spokesman stressed that Britain had not been involved in negotiating any possible trade-offs aimed at sealing Gaddafi’s exit from power. “There are no deals,” he said. The disclosure that private conversations have been going on between western officials and their Libyan counterparts, even as the same governments have been bombing Libyan troops on the ground, have come in the wake of the defection of Gaddafi’s most senior ally to the UK earlier this week, the former foreign minister and intelligence chief Moussa Koussa. The comments made by Obeidi, an influential former diplomat who was a key negotiator of Libya’s renunciation of its nuclear weapons programme, appear to verify claims made by the US secretary of state, Hilary Clinton that she was aware that people close to Gaddafi were attempting to make contact. His remarks emerged at the same time as a senior rebel spokesman laid out conditions for a ceasefire, the key demand being that Gaddafi pulls his military forces out of all of the country’s cities and permits peaceful protests against his regime. The conditions were announced by Mustafa Abdul-Jalil, head of the opposition’s interim governing council based in Benghazi, who spoke during a joint press conference with the United Nations envoy Abdelilah al-Khatib. Khatib is visiting Benghazi in the hope of reaching a political solution to the crisis embroiling the North African nation. Abdul-Jalil said the rebels’ condition for a ceasefire was “that the Gaddafi brigades and forces withdraw from inside and outside Libyan cities to give freedom to the Libyan people to choose, and the world will see that they will choose freedom”. Libya Arab and Middle East unrest Foreign policy US foreign policy Middle East Peter Beaumont guardian.co.uk
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Courthouse wakes held in England and Wales as JPs say government decision will mean the death of local justice How do you decommission a courthouse with judicial dignity? In Lyndhurst, Hampshire, they cleared Court One of defendants, broke out the wine glasses and mourned the “death of local justice”. Similar makeshift wakes have been held around the country as scores of magistrates and county courts closed their doors for the final time this week. In Ely, Cambridgeshire, the high sheriff’s ceremonial sword sent the security scanner haywire as dignitaries trooped into the newly redundant, 19th century assize court. But the government programme to close 142 English and Welsh courts and save £41.5m a year has also provoked a spirit of rebellion among independent-minded JPs . Three judicial reviews have been launched, challenging decisions by Kenneth Clarke’s Ministry of Justice. Because buildings have no legal status, magistrates in west Somerset have set up a private company, Save Local Justice (Sedgemoor), to initiate action. In South Wales, Vale of Glamorgan council is furious at having to pay an extra £200,000 a year to transfer casework to Cardiff and has lodged papers opposing the closure of Barry magistrates court. In Sittingbourne, Kent, lawyers have banded together to save their courtroom. The Magistrates’ Association paid for legal advice to help local benches considering seeking judicial reviews. “Justice should be delivered so that the public can see it being done,” said John Thornhill, chairman of the national association. “We are concerned at the move to regional centres. It will be a disincentive for defendants to travel long distances on buses at their own expense. We may see more defendants failing to turn up, so more warrants being issued and higher costs as defendants fill up more police cells.” The number of magistrates in England and Wales has fallen from 30,000 to 27,000 over the past 18 months through a process of delayed recruitment and retirement. At least 40 courts will have been closed by today; almost all the others that have been targeted will be gone by 2012. A spokeswoman from HM Courts Service said: “Substantial savings will be made from not having to maintain so many buildings and there will be efficiency savings for other justice agencies by focusing their attendance at a single accessible location within a community.” Magistrates in Lyndhurst also considered a judicial review. Maggie Hill, chair of the New Forest bench, has fought a campaign to preserve the spacious courthouse, which was opened in 1995. Paint may be peeling off the modernist portico and offenders may have scratched their names on the court’s wooden nameplate but inside, the last days of criminal justice in the New Forest passed in an orderly succession of motoring offences and breaches of community orders. A youth, described as autistic, who had overslept and failed to comply with an earlier sentence stood in the secure glass dock. His solicitor pleaded that he needed to “see light at the end of the tunnel”; the community order was extended by 24 hours and a £50 fine imposed. A 21-year-old convicted of waving an air pistol around in a public place and criminal damage when he smashed glass panels inside his parents’ rented home was said to have admitted: “I can’t control my anger”. His mother, bobbing three times in deference to magistrates, spoke on his behalf, hinting at deeper family problems. The failure to keep meetings with probation officers was punished by a £50 fine and extra hours of unpaid work. “If you breach this, another bench may be unsympathetic,” he was warned. Hill, who has been a magistrate since 1997, believes the closure of Lyndhurst is misguided. “It will be the death of local justice,” she said. “It may save some money but not as much as anticipated. There’s no magistrates court left in the New Forest; that’s an area of 290 square miles.” Work will be transferred – involving increased travelling costs – to Southampton. One court, in an outbuilding, closed 18 months ago. The other two were working five days a week with full lists until recently. “After only 15 years of use,” Hill said, “a modern, well-appointed and functional building will now go to waste along with its visible presence of justice in our unique community.” She scheduled the court’s last sitting for today: “I thought April Fool’s Day would be quite appropriate.” Ludlow magistrates court, which dates back to the 14th century, hosted a national celebration in January of the 650th anniversary of the 1361 Justices of the Peace Act, which established the practical framework of British justice. “Ludlow was the oldest working court in the country,” Stuart Sutton, chairman of the Shropshire branch of the Magistrates’ Association , said. “Now it’s closed and everyone will have to go to Telford, 28 miles away. There’s no good public transport link. You will have defendants, victims and witnesses all travelling on the same bus together for trials in unprotected circumstances. “It’s the withdrawal of yet another service from small county towns that are struggling to maintain their identity. It’s the antithesis of the ‘big society’ and getting people involved together in communities to stop reoffending.” Once judicial work has been centralised in cities and larger court complexes, abandoned buildings will be put up for sale in a flat commercial property market. The Ministry of Justice claims it will raise £38.5m from these assets. Mike Dodden, a magistrate of 22 years’ standing, helped set up SLJ (Sedgemoor) to preserve Bridgwater court. “Our court was built 100 years ago. It’s running five full days a week,” he said. “Now there will be more prison escorts and more magistrates’ expenses to pay.” Even the local Conservative MP, Ian Liddell-Grainger, has fought to preserve it. The Ministry of Justice said: “Closures will ultimately help to modernise and improve the use of courts in England and Wales. Keeping under-utilised courts open is simply not a good use of taxpayers’ money and resources must be targeted to best effect in order to provide value for money. “Accessibility for court users is, of course, an important factor. People should not have to make unreasonably long journeys to court, but this is not the only concern. The speed with which cases get decided, the facilities we can provide to meet the needs of all court users and respect for the quality of our justice system matters equally, if not more.” In Lyndhurst, the elaborate royal crests positioned behind the bench will soon be unscrewed and removed. And there will be silence in court. UK criminal justice Kenneth Clarke Liberal-Conservative coalition Owen Bowcott guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Courthouse wakes held in England and Wales as JPs say government decision will mean the death of local justice How do you decommission a courthouse with judicial dignity? In Lyndhurst, Hampshire, they cleared Court One of defendants, broke out the wine glasses and mourned the “death of local justice”. Similar makeshift wakes have been held around the country as scores of magistrates and county courts closed their doors for the final time this week. In Ely, Cambridgeshire, the high sheriff’s ceremonial sword sent the security scanner haywire as dignitaries trooped into the newly redundant, 19th century assize court. But the government programme to close 142 English and Welsh courts and save £41.5m a year has also provoked a spirit of rebellion among independent-minded JPs . Three judicial reviews have been launched, challenging decisions by Kenneth Clarke’s Ministry of Justice. Because buildings have no legal status, magistrates in west Somerset have set up a private company, Save Local Justice (Sedgemoor), to initiate action. In South Wales, Vale of Glamorgan council is furious at having to pay an extra £200,000 a year to transfer casework to Cardiff and has lodged papers opposing the closure of Barry magistrates court. In Sittingbourne, Kent, lawyers have banded together to save their courtroom. The Magistrates’ Association paid for legal advice to help local benches considering seeking judicial reviews. “Justice should be delivered so that the public can see it being done,” said John Thornhill, chairman of the national association. “We are concerned at the move to regional centres. It will be a disincentive for defendants to travel long distances on buses at their own expense. We may see more defendants failing to turn up, so more warrants being issued and higher costs as defendants fill up more police cells.” The number of magistrates in England and Wales has fallen from 30,000 to 27,000 over the past 18 months through a process of delayed recruitment and retirement. At least 40 courts will have been closed by today; almost all the others that have been targeted will be gone by 2012. A spokeswoman from HM Courts Service said: “Substantial savings will be made from not having to maintain so many buildings and there will be efficiency savings for other justice agencies by focusing their attendance at a single accessible location within a community.” Magistrates in Lyndhurst also considered a judicial review. Maggie Hill, chair of the New Forest bench, has fought a campaign to preserve the spacious courthouse, which was opened in 1995. Paint may be peeling off the modernist portico and offenders may have scratched their names on the court’s wooden nameplate but inside, the last days of criminal justice in the New Forest passed in an orderly succession of motoring offences and breaches of community orders. A youth, described as autistic, who had overslept and failed to comply with an earlier sentence stood in the secure glass dock. His solicitor pleaded that he needed to “see light at the end of the tunnel”; the community order was extended by 24 hours and a £50 fine imposed. A 21-year-old convicted of waving an air pistol around in a public place and criminal damage when he smashed glass panels inside his parents’ rented home was said to have admitted: “I can’t control my anger”. His mother, bobbing three times in deference to magistrates, spoke on his behalf, hinting at deeper family problems. The failure to keep meetings with probation officers was punished by a £50 fine and extra hours of unpaid work. “If you breach this, another bench may be unsympathetic,” he was warned. Hill, who has been a magistrate since 1997, believes the closure of Lyndhurst is misguided. “It will be the death of local justice,” she said. “It may save some money but not as much as anticipated. There’s no magistrates court left in the New Forest; that’s an area of 290 square miles.” Work will be transferred – involving increased travelling costs – to Southampton. One court, in an outbuilding, closed 18 months ago. The other two were working five days a week with full lists until recently. “After only 15 years of use,” Hill said, “a modern, well-appointed and functional building will now go to waste along with its visible presence of justice in our unique community.” She scheduled the court’s last sitting for today: “I thought April Fool’s Day would be quite appropriate.” Ludlow magistrates court, which dates back to the 14th century, hosted a national celebration in January of the 650th anniversary of the 1361 Justices of the Peace Act, which established the practical framework of British justice. “Ludlow was the oldest working court in the country,” Stuart Sutton, chairman of the Shropshire branch of the Magistrates’ Association , said. “Now it’s closed and everyone will have to go to Telford, 28 miles away. There’s no good public transport link. You will have defendants, victims and witnesses all travelling on the same bus together for trials in unprotected circumstances. “It’s the withdrawal of yet another service from small county towns that are struggling to maintain their identity. It’s the antithesis of the ‘big society’ and getting people involved together in communities to stop reoffending.” Once judicial work has been centralised in cities and larger court complexes, abandoned buildings will be put up for sale in a flat commercial property market. The Ministry of Justice claims it will raise £38.5m from these assets. Mike Dodden, a magistrate of 22 years’ standing, helped set up SLJ (Sedgemoor) to preserve Bridgwater court. “Our court was built 100 years ago. It’s running five full days a week,” he said. “Now there will be more prison escorts and more magistrates’ expenses to pay.” Even the local Conservative MP, Ian Liddell-Grainger, has fought to preserve it. The Ministry of Justice said: “Closures will ultimately help to modernise and improve the use of courts in England and Wales. Keeping under-utilised courts open is simply not a good use of taxpayers’ money and resources must be targeted to best effect in order to provide value for money. “Accessibility for court users is, of course, an important factor. People should not have to make unreasonably long journeys to court, but this is not the only concern. The speed with which cases get decided, the facilities we can provide to meet the needs of all court users and respect for the quality of our justice system matters equally, if not more.” In Lyndhurst, the elaborate royal crests positioned behind the bench will soon be unscrewed and removed. And there will be silence in court. UK criminal justice Kenneth Clarke Liberal-Conservative coalition Owen Bowcott guardian.co.uk
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A 2003 Guardian investigation revealed poor workers’ conditions and environmental degradation . Felicity Lawrence finds that despite progress, concerns remain over water scarcity and tax H3O Pink is a term to remember if you are looking for a commercial way to express love on Mother’s Day on Sunday. It is the name given by hi-tech breeders to one of the roses being imported by the million this week from Kenya’s leading flower company, Flamingo Homegrown, as supermarkets such as M&S gear up for a peak in sales. Flamingo’s warm pink rose, marketed as symbolising a gentler love than the red-blooded passion of crimson Valentine’s blooms, will be the supermarket’s biggest seller this weekend. The accidental hint of water in the H3O name is apposite too, as the majority of our flowers today are imported by air freight from water-scarce countries in Africa. Flamingo’s farms and those of the other largest flower multinationals are concentrated around one of the few fresh water lakes in Kenya, Lake Naivasha. As climate change threatens more frequent drought and with population growth adding to pressure on resources, the water footprint of this kind of trade is again under scrutiny. Flowers are one of Kenya’s main sources of foreign currency earnings, bringing in over $500m a year to the economy, but questions are also beginning to be asked about how much of that money actually stays in Kenya. The head of the Kenya Revenue Authority, John Njiraini, has announced that he is investigating the whole flower sector, including the three largest multinational exporters, because he suspects they are shifting profits to other jurisdictions and not paying their fair share of tax in Kenya . The flower business has been controversial for other reasons too. In 2003 campaigners raised the alarm about conditions for the workers on some of the flower farms and in packhouses. A Guardian investigation back then made public serious concerns about health and safety arising from chemical spraying, very long working hours and instances of harassment. So Guardian Films, with funding from Christian Aid, went back to Kenya to look into the new complaint about tax and to see if conditions had changed . Flying out of Nairobi as you pass over the huge geological fault line of the Great Rift Valley, its floor opens out in front of you with Lake Naivasha gleaming like a sheet of glass below. Originally Masai grazing land, this was one of the first areas settled by white farmers. Today huge stretches of white plastic reflect back the equatorial light. These are the greenhouses of the intensive farms. In 2009 the industry had a wake-up call. The lake, on which the flower farms depend for irrigation, shrank dramatically following a prolonged drought, putting the whole business under threat. A flash storm then washed untreated sewage from Naivasha town and, it is suspected, chemical residues from some of the farms into the lake, killing large numbers of fish. The population of the town has grown from around 6,000 people in the early 1980s to around 240,000 now, according to its mayor, Paul Karanja, largely thanks to an influx of migrants from other parts of Kenya who are drawn to the farms for work. Its infrastructure has not been able to keep up. On top of the sewage problems, schools are struggling to cope with classes of up to 80 children and patients in the hospital sometimes have to share beds, he told us. The crisis has, however, accelerated efforts to make the area more sustainable. The big companies such as Flamingo have invested millions of pounds in recent years to minimise their water use and maximise recycling and rainwater harvesting. Flamingo’s general manager, Craig Oulton, told us it had cut its water use in half in 10 years by completely rethinking its growing practices. But perhaps more significant is that businesses such as Flamingo now acknowledge that cutting their own water use is not enough if they do not help with the wider needs around them. “In the last two years the water dropped to levels not seen since the 1940s. We have had to take our programmes outside our gates. Social equity now has to be part of the equation if we want our business to survive,” Flamingo’s head of sustainable business, Richard Fox, told us. The horticultural companies agreed last year to pay a new local tax to the town, based on acreage, to tackle infrastructure problems. Regulation of water use has been very weak, so M&S has put up funding to help develop a democratic system of negotiating how all the groups that depend on the lake will share its water and cut back in times of drought. These include Masai pastoralists, smallholders, fishermen and tourist hotels as well as big horticulture companies. Louise Nicolls, M&S’s head of sustainable sourcing, explained why the company felt it needed to get involved. “As climate change impacts we will have to make some very difficult choices about where we source food and flowers, especially if it’s a water-vulnerable country. If you want a mandate to supply from a particular country, it will be very important to show the wider benefit of your trade there.” The bad publicity in 2003 has driven other changes too. Roses are a luxury feel-good purchase. If consumers feel bad about how they are produced, they may not want to buy at all, so companies have had to respond to criticisms. All Flamingo flowers are now produced to Fairtrade standards. The company has also cut its pesticide use drastically. The most toxic Class 1 chemicals are no longer used, and most pests are treated with biological controls instead, including the deployment of ladybirds and other predators cultivated in specially built bug harvesting greenhouses. Labour conditions on Flamingo’s farms have also radically improved, as workers we interviewed independently away from the farms confirmed. Overtime is now voluntary, casual contracts have mostly been replaced with permanent ones and a determined effort has been made to train and promote women supervisors and eliminate harassment. Gender and welfare committees help to deal with any problems swiftly. The agricultural workers union, which has not yet won recognition at the company, would like to see a greater distribution of profits in the form of higher wages, but wages and benefits are at least above average. Most of the workers from other big companies we interviewed said they were glad to have the jobs but that it was a constant struggle to survive on pay that averaged £50 to £60 a month. Rachel English is co-ordinator for Women Working Worldwide , the organisation that originally blew the whistle on conditions in the African flower sector. The Guardian asked her how much progress she thought had been made. “They have made progress on labour rights, but the question remains, are the workers earning a living wage? What’s fair? The big farms may pay more than others, but it’s still nothing like enough to live on decently. That’s the next challenge.” Flower trends The best-selling roses are white and yellow, but the fashion for vintage clothing has filtered through to the flower market, with washed-out tones of pale pink, oatmeal and even soft brown gaining popularity. Bouquet trends, meanwhile, are shifting from the clash of bold colours of recent years to a more subtle mix of shades and tones of the same colour. Plant breeding over the years has concentrated on producing the perfect shape, colour, stem length and shelf life for cut roses, with the result that scent has faded. Breeders have been working to bring back the rose’s distinctive fragrance, crossing old English varieties with newer ones. However, the unconventional, slightly serrated petals this produces have not proved popular with the public. Fair trade Ethical and green living Retail industry Kenya Tax avoidance Mother’s Day Water Farming Corporate social responsibility Felicity Lawrence guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …A 2003 Guardian investigation revealed poor workers’ conditions and environmental degradation . Felicity Lawrence finds that despite progress, concerns remain over water scarcity and tax H3O Pink is a term to remember if you are looking for a commercial way to express love on Mother’s Day on Sunday. It is the name given by hi-tech breeders to one of the roses being imported by the million this week from Kenya’s leading flower company, Flamingo Homegrown, as supermarkets such as M&S gear up for a peak in sales. Flamingo’s warm pink rose, marketed as symbolising a gentler love than the red-blooded passion of crimson Valentine’s blooms, will be the supermarket’s biggest seller this weekend. The accidental hint of water in the H3O name is apposite too, as the majority of our flowers today are imported by air freight from water-scarce countries in Africa. Flamingo’s farms and those of the other largest flower multinationals are concentrated around one of the few fresh water lakes in Kenya, Lake Naivasha. As climate change threatens more frequent drought and with population growth adding to pressure on resources, the water footprint of this kind of trade is again under scrutiny. Flowers are one of Kenya’s main sources of foreign currency earnings, bringing in over $500m a year to the economy, but questions are also beginning to be asked about how much of that money actually stays in Kenya. The head of the Kenya Revenue Authority, John Njiraini, has announced that he is investigating the whole flower sector, including the three largest multinational exporters, because he suspects they are shifting profits to other jurisdictions and not paying their fair share of tax in Kenya . The flower business has been controversial for other reasons too. In 2003 campaigners raised the alarm about conditions for the workers on some of the flower farms and in packhouses. A Guardian investigation back then made public serious concerns about health and safety arising from chemical spraying, very long working hours and instances of harassment. So Guardian Films, with funding from Christian Aid, went back to Kenya to look into the new complaint about tax and to see if conditions had changed . Flying out of Nairobi as you pass over the huge geological fault line of the Great Rift Valley, its floor opens out in front of you with Lake Naivasha gleaming like a sheet of glass below. Originally Masai grazing land, this was one of the first areas settled by white farmers. Today huge stretches of white plastic reflect back the equatorial light. These are the greenhouses of the intensive farms. In 2009 the industry had a wake-up call. The lake, on which the flower farms depend for irrigation, shrank dramatically following a prolonged drought, putting the whole business under threat. A flash storm then washed untreated sewage from Naivasha town and, it is suspected, chemical residues from some of the farms into the lake, killing large numbers of fish. The population of the town has grown from around 6,000 people in the early 1980s to around 240,000 now, according to its mayor, Paul Karanja, largely thanks to an influx of migrants from other parts of Kenya who are drawn to the farms for work. Its infrastructure has not been able to keep up. On top of the sewage problems, schools are struggling to cope with classes of up to 80 children and patients in the hospital sometimes have to share beds, he told us. The crisis has, however, accelerated efforts to make the area more sustainable. The big companies such as Flamingo have invested millions of pounds in recent years to minimise their water use and maximise recycling and rainwater harvesting. Flamingo’s general manager, Craig Oulton, told us it had cut its water use in half in 10 years by completely rethinking its growing practices. But perhaps more significant is that businesses such as Flamingo now acknowledge that cutting their own water use is not enough if they do not help with the wider needs around them. “In the last two years the water dropped to levels not seen since the 1940s. We have had to take our programmes outside our gates. Social equity now has to be part of the equation if we want our business to survive,” Flamingo’s head of sustainable business, Richard Fox, told us. The horticultural companies agreed last year to pay a new local tax to the town, based on acreage, to tackle infrastructure problems. Regulation of water use has been very weak, so M&S has put up funding to help develop a democratic system of negotiating how all the groups that depend on the lake will share its water and cut back in times of drought. These include Masai pastoralists, smallholders, fishermen and tourist hotels as well as big horticulture companies. Louise Nicolls, M&S’s head of sustainable sourcing, explained why the company felt it needed to get involved. “As climate change impacts we will have to make some very difficult choices about where we source food and flowers, especially if it’s a water-vulnerable country. If you want a mandate to supply from a particular country, it will be very important to show the wider benefit of your trade there.” The bad publicity in 2003 has driven other changes too. Roses are a luxury feel-good purchase. If consumers feel bad about how they are produced, they may not want to buy at all, so companies have had to respond to criticisms. All Flamingo flowers are now produced to Fairtrade standards. The company has also cut its pesticide use drastically. The most toxic Class 1 chemicals are no longer used, and most pests are treated with biological controls instead, including the deployment of ladybirds and other predators cultivated in specially built bug harvesting greenhouses. Labour conditions on Flamingo’s farms have also radically improved, as workers we interviewed independently away from the farms confirmed. Overtime is now voluntary, casual contracts have mostly been replaced with permanent ones and a determined effort has been made to train and promote women supervisors and eliminate harassment. Gender and welfare committees help to deal with any problems swiftly. The agricultural workers union, which has not yet won recognition at the company, would like to see a greater distribution of profits in the form of higher wages, but wages and benefits are at least above average. Most of the workers from other big companies we interviewed said they were glad to have the jobs but that it was a constant struggle to survive on pay that averaged £50 to £60 a month. Rachel English is co-ordinator for Women Working Worldwide , the organisation that originally blew the whistle on conditions in the African flower sector. The Guardian asked her how much progress she thought had been made. “They have made progress on labour rights, but the question remains, are the workers earning a living wage? What’s fair? The big farms may pay more than others, but it’s still nothing like enough to live on decently. That’s the next challenge.” Flower trends The best-selling roses are white and yellow, but the fashion for vintage clothing has filtered through to the flower market, with washed-out tones of pale pink, oatmeal and even soft brown gaining popularity. Bouquet trends, meanwhile, are shifting from the clash of bold colours of recent years to a more subtle mix of shades and tones of the same colour. Plant breeding over the years has concentrated on producing the perfect shape, colour, stem length and shelf life for cut roses, with the result that scent has faded. Breeders have been working to bring back the rose’s distinctive fragrance, crossing old English varieties with newer ones. However, the unconventional, slightly serrated petals this produces have not proved popular with the public. Fair trade Ethical and green living Retail industry Kenya Tax avoidance Mother’s Day Water Farming Corporate social responsibility Felicity Lawrence guardian.co.uk
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Police, who arrested suspect at scene, say 14-year-old Chloe West is in stable condition after incident in Stourbridge A 14-year-old girl has been airlifted to hospital after she was stabbed by a man outside a secondary school. The attacker was held by staff, parents and pupils after stabbing Chloe West several times outside Ridgewood high school in Stourbridge, West Midlands. West Midlands police said an 18-year-old, believed to have been known to West, was arrested at the scene. West was rushed to Birmingham children’s hospital with several wounds to her upper body. Police said she was undergoing surgery but was stable and improving. She is not thought to be in a life-threatening condition. Speaking to reporters near the scene, Superintendent Stuart Johnson praised the bravery of staff, students and parents who stepped in to halt the attack. He said: “I would just like to pay tribute to the very brave individuals who, without too much thought for their own safety, intervened at the time of the incident this morning.” Those who held the man had been confronted by a frightening scene, Johnson said: “They showed tremendous bravery in intervening and actually detaining the suspect. In my opinion, based on medical evidence, they clearly prevented far more serious injuries to Chloe.” Officers were called to reports of a girl being stabbed near the school’s main gates at 8.42am and were at the scene within minutes. Johnson said: “On arrival, they saw that there was indeed a young lady, who we since know to be a pupil at the school, with serious injuries, believed to be knife wounds. “They also found that a young man, who we have since established does not attend the school, had been detained by members of the public here in the street.” The man, who is known to have suffered injuries to his hands, was taken into custody. Crime Knife crime guardian.co.uk
Continue reading …Police, who arrested suspect at scene, say 14-year-old Chloe West is in stable condition after incident in Stourbridge A 14-year-old girl has been airlifted to hospital after she was stabbed by a man outside a secondary school. The attacker was held by staff, parents and pupils after stabbing Chloe West several times outside Ridgewood high school in Stourbridge, West Midlands. West Midlands police said an 18-year-old, believed to have been known to West, was arrested at the scene. West was rushed to Birmingham children’s hospital with several wounds to her upper body. Police said she was undergoing surgery but was stable and improving. She is not thought to be in a life-threatening condition. Speaking to reporters near the scene, Superintendent Stuart Johnson praised the bravery of staff, students and parents who stepped in to halt the attack. He said: “I would just like to pay tribute to the very brave individuals who, without too much thought for their own safety, intervened at the time of the incident this morning.” Those who held the man had been confronted by a frightening scene, Johnson said: “They showed tremendous bravery in intervening and actually detaining the suspect. In my opinion, based on medical evidence, they clearly prevented far more serious injuries to Chloe.” Officers were called to reports of a girl being stabbed near the school’s main gates at 8.42am and were at the scene within minutes. Johnson said: “On arrival, they saw that there was indeed a young lady, who we since know to be a pupil at the school, with serious injuries, believed to be knife wounds. “They also found that a young man, who we have since established does not attend the school, had been detained by members of the public here in the street.” The man, who is known to have suffered injuries to his hands, was taken into custody. Crime Knife crime guardian.co.uk
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Police, who arrested suspect at scene, say 14-year-old Chloe West is in stable condition after incident in Stourbridge A 14-year-old girl has been airlifted to hospital after she was stabbed by a man outside a secondary school. The attacker was held by staff, parents and pupils after stabbing Chloe West several times outside Ridgewood high school in Stourbridge, West Midlands. West Midlands police said an 18-year-old, believed to have been known to West, was arrested at the scene. West was rushed to Birmingham children’s hospital with several wounds to her upper body. Police said she was undergoing surgery but was stable and improving. She is not thought to be in a life-threatening condition. Speaking to reporters near the scene, Superintendent Stuart Johnson praised the bravery of staff, students and parents who stepped in to halt the attack. He said: “I would just like to pay tribute to the very brave individuals who, without too much thought for their own safety, intervened at the time of the incident this morning.” Those who held the man had been confronted by a frightening scene, Johnson said: “They showed tremendous bravery in intervening and actually detaining the suspect. In my opinion, based on medical evidence, they clearly prevented far more serious injuries to Chloe.” Officers were called to reports of a girl being stabbed near the school’s main gates at 8.42am and were at the scene within minutes. Johnson said: “On arrival, they saw that there was indeed a young lady, who we since know to be a pupil at the school, with serious injuries, believed to be knife wounds. “They also found that a young man, who we have since established does not attend the school, had been detained by members of the public here in the street.” The man, who is known to have suffered injuries to his hands, was taken into custody. Crime Knife crime guardian.co.uk
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