Ten years ago, Xinia Briceño received the alert that the water in her community was polluted. Studies proved that it had residues of agrochemicals. This was almost six years ago. Now a truck has to come twice a week to the village to provide drinking water to its residents.
Xinia Briceño lives in Milano, Limón one of the several communities in Costa Rica, where the pineapple industry has settled in. This tropical fruit is currently the country’s leading export crop. Just in 2012, pineapple exports generated a total of $789.4 million, 52% of the product goes to Europe. Even if Costa Rica has grown pineapple for the foreign markets since the sixties, over the last ten years the activity has risen exponentially. The cultivation area went from 16.000 hectares in 2003 to 42.000 in 2012, according to the Ministry of Agriculture.
Bitter taste
According to the National Chamber of Pineapple Producers (CANAPEP), besides the revenues, the pineapple industry gives to the country 25.200 direct jobs. Nevertheless, this phenomenon has also lead to negative consequences for communities next to plantations and for workers.
To export the fruit, the enterprises have to fulfill certain legal requirements and international certifications, such as EUREPGAP or the ISO 14000. They guarantee that the product has certain standards. However, the companies are not obliged to have a mitigation plan for the social and environmental impacts. At the same time, the ministries of Agriculture, Environment and Health are in charge of technical supervision of plantations, but a lack of personnel hinders the fulfillment of these functions.
As a result, problems such as water and soil pollution, erosion, sedimentation and deforestation, have arisen. For example, the community of El Cairo, in Limón, has had to collect their drinking water from a tanker since 2005, after tests made by the Costa Rican Institute of Aqueducts and Sewers (AyA), that determined the water had traces of the agrochemical Bromacil (used in pineapple production), 1.73 micrograms per litter, which is way above the quantity allowed for human consumption at 0.70.
“After the year 2000, when the pineapple plantations were installed in our community, people’s health have deteriorated. Since then, people began reporting breathing problems, skin diseases and cancer”, said Erlinda Quesada, a community leader in Guácimo, Limón. Due to the expansion of big plantations, some local farmers are incapable of competing, so most of the time they decide to sell their lands to big enterprises. Most of the workers are men between the ages of 18 to 26, and around 70% are Nicaraguan immigrants, especially in the north of the country, and the Caribbean coast. Didier Leitón, member of the Union of Plantation Workers (Sitrap in Spanish), explained that depending on the plantation, the working time can go from eight to sixteen hours a day, and average salaries are below the minimum wage, between 10 to 30 dollars a day.
To avoid the payment of social security charges, some companies subcontract enterprises to hire workers. They make temporary contracts for two or three months, so that they can lay off workers without employer liability. This also reduces the company’s direct responsibility to provide adequate working conditions. Despite these situations, most of the workers have no choice, considering that pineapple or banana plantations are the only sources of employment.
What to do?
Since Europe is the main market for Costa Rica’s pineapple, some organizations, such as Consumers International, have tried to raise awareness of the situation in this tropical Central American country. For consumers, looking for certifications such as Fairtrade, is a way to ensure that the pineapple comes from a plantation with good social and environmental practices. Also, some communities have found shelter in environmental organizations that help them fight for their rights. The community of Guácimo, for example, after struggling for several months, managed to make the local authorities adopt a moratorium on the cultivation of pineapple in the southern part of the region, were previous plantations had polluted the water.
The alternative for Erlinda Quesada, the community leader in Guácimo, is simple: “Instead of pineapple plantations, we need support from the local government to invest in rural tourism, and give more credit facilities to local entrepreneurs”.
This solution is possible. For example, a few kilometers from Guácimo several families united to create the Association of farms for the development of rural community tourism (AFITURA). The idea was to provide locals an alternative for sustainable development.
If the plantations continue to grow without regulations and social responsibilities, Xinia Briceño and her family will continue to receive water from a truck. For them the drinkable liquid will just be a memory once shattered by a fruit that came to the community without invitation.
By Camila Salazar, Costa Rica
Photos by Camila Salazar
