Lidl will pay banana pickers more wages

2024-04-17 06:49:00

Supermarket chain Lidl pays extra money to workers on banana plantations so that they can purchase basic necessities. The company participates in a collaboration between various supermarkets led by the Sustainable Trade Initiative (IDH) organization. They have agreed that next year they will pay a ‘living wage’ for the bananas they purchase.

Lidl has now reached this point and Jordy van Honk of IDH expects other Dutch supermarkets to do the same this year and next year. For a long time, supermarkets had little idea where their bananas came from. Taking responsibility for the salary of a picker on a plantation was complicated because it was unclear what a living wage should be.

Over the past four years, we have better mapped out what a living wage entails for each country. IDH has developed a calculation model that allows supermarkets to clearly see per country, per plantation and even function what is being paid and what needs to be added to bridge the gap to a living wage.

Accessible sustainable choice

Lidl carried out this calculation for two hundred plantations in Ecuador, Colombia, Costa Rica and Guatemala. Lidl pays more, but the supermarket chain does not want to say how much extra has to be put on the table in total. Sustainability specialist Rebekah Simmons: “We pay an extra amount to the plantations followingwards so that the employees receive a bonus, a supplementary salary or, for example, a voucher for a local supermarket. We have done that before 2023.”

A higher wage for workers on the plantations does not mean that the price of bananas at Lidl will increase. “The price remains unchanged. We make a sustainable choice accessible to everyone,” says Simmons.

Whether the money actually reaches the employees is checked by a certification agency that also checks the standards for the Fair Trade and Rainforest Alliance quality marks, says Jordy van Honk of IDH.

Lidl only pays for part of the gap that needs to be bridged to achieve a living wage for all employees of a plantation. Each buyer is responsible for the percentage equal to the percentage of bananas purchased. To bridge the entire gap to a living wage, all customers would have to pay extra money.

High on the agenda

To really change something, Van Honk believes, it is important that as many supermarkets as possible participate. IDH not only organizes supermarkets in the Netherlands, but also in Belgium and the United Kingdom. Through an affiliated organization, supermarkets in Germany are also being urged to pay a living wage to banana pickers.

What helps, says Van Honk, is that the ILO, the international organization that monitors workers’ rights worldwide, has also recently become concerned regarding a living wage. “What people should earn is higher on the agenda.”

What also helps are European rules for corporate social responsibility, the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive, whereby companies must indicate how responsibly they have arranged their purchasing. In addition, listed companies must prepare an annual sustainability report next year in which they account for their own behavior and that of their suppliers.

Also read:

Supermarkets want living wages on banana plantations

Dutch supermarkets will help workers on the banana plantations get better pay. The bananas are purchased at a higher price.

1713356793
#Lidl #pay #banana #pickers #wages