Industry cannot afford increase for estate workers

Estate workers last week launched a campaign demanding a daily wage increase up to Rs. 700 to face increasing commodity prices. The estate sector is the most underprivileged in the country whose poverty head count index is 9.2 percent higher compared to 7.7 percent in rural and 6.5 percent in urban sectors.

The campaign has been launched targeting the next collective agreement to be signed in March this year and the trade unions are threatening to go for trade union action if the authorities failed to grant their demand. The lives of estate workers have become difficult due to the rising cost of essential food items. The percentage of malnutrition, anaemia, underweight children and stillbirths in the estates is very high. The cause of this is unbearable economic pressure.

As a result of the low income of estate workers and the rising cost of living, children in the estate sector give up education. The number of children who work as domestics or child labourers has increased, the union said. One argument of the trade union is why plantation companies cannot increase wages when tea is traded at very high price. They said that the plantation companies are not ready to increase welfare facilities for workers although they earn huge profits.

A private estate owner said that tea prices are not high enough to increase wages. Prices are just enough to break even and a daily wage increase up to Rs. 700 will ruin the industry. He said that only high grade tea earn profits and producers of second and third grade tea are running their businesses with difficulty.

Some big plantation management companies are planing to give up the business due to continuous losses they earn. Reasons for these big plantation companies to run at a loss are high over head costs and not mismanagement of the plantations. They only extract the maximum out of the plantations because these estates are leased out to them for 50 years.

However, he agreed that plantation workers cannot live with their present daily wage of Rs. 447.75 as the cost of living is sky rocketing. At least a Rs. 500 daily wage is acceptable but even at that rate the industry will face difficulties, he said.

The Chairman of the Employers Federation Ravi Peris was not available for comment.

(GW)