by Bob Holmes

"The road is impassible for up to five days when it rains. Milk needs to be shipped out daily," the cattleman informed the politicians at Yarima. "This region has the highest production of cacao in all of Colombia," said the farmer, "We need better roads to get our product out." "Oil was discovered here first in Colombia. So why is there no natural gas service in Yarima?" asked the petroleum union leader. "Where is the social investment by the corporations and the government?" demanded the human rights worker.

Over 200 community members met with representatives of the Legislative Assembly of the Department of Santander for over five hours on 19 June 2008. They raised complaints about police camped in the school and a new non-functioning sewer system, but the big topic of the day, and what brought the government officials to town, was the sixty-three-day-old strike of oil palm workers.

The Government of Colombia, in cahoots with big business, is touting a system of contracting workers through what they call "cooperatives." Workers must join cooperatives, and contract their services to companies. The coops, and not the companies must pay the workers, buy their tools from the company and receive a fixed (low) price for the product. After discounting pension and benefits, workers make less than minimum wage working for a high profit industry in Colombia. The workers have no ownership of the land, the company or the product -which means these coops are not "cooperative" in the sense of the traditional model found working well in other places around the world.

The palm oil workers went on strike to demonstrate their opposition to this "uncooperative" system. Negotiations, which included federal government officials, broke down. Hence the meeting in Yarima to try restarting negotiations.

After listening for hours, the President of the Assembly of Santander asked the workers if they would end their strike and reenter negotiations if the company signs the "temporary" agreement drafted by both sides in which the company pays a higher price for produce. The workers responded, "This is what we have been proposing but yet the companies have refused to sign." The company officials did not show their faces in Yarima, but had met with the Assembly President the day before. The Assembly President promised to mediate if the workers and the company reenter negotiations.

The palm oil workers are not unionized, but they are united and enjoy almost universal popular support in the area. They may win this struggle.