Following a three-year programme backed by retailers including Lidl and Tesco, a roadmap for negotiating living wages throughout the banana supply chain in Côte d’Ivoire has been approved
Key players in the Côte d’Ivoire banana supply chain have signed a roadmap for negotiating living wages in the industry, including banana firms, workers unions, retailers, state actors and the International Labour Organisation (ILO).
This follows a three-year programme, led by campaign group Banana Link and co-financed by IDH and six European retailers including Lidl France and Tesco, to ready the Ivorian industry for collective bargaining in order to close the gap between workers’ pay and living wages.
“Three years ago, the Banana Link-led process began with a series of trade union capacity building workshops for women and men workers’ leaders, enabling them to collaborate on wage data validation with the Ivorian research institute CIRES,” said Banana Link. “Last year, a key milestone was celebrated when all ten workers unions active in the Ivorian banana industry came together to form the first national union federation. Simultaneously, the two trade associations representing Ivorian banana companies collaborated for the first time, with support from producers’ association Afruibana.”
This year, a bipartite working group was formed between FETBACI, the trade union federation, and all the national companies.
“The working group was tasked with designing a national collective bargaining agreement for the sector by 2026 which covers decent work and living wages,” Banana Link stated. “In parallel, a process to establish a framework for decent price commitments on the part of retailers – the foundation on which the pillars of decent work and living wages are constructed – is being developed.”
Producers association Afruibana said the industry was committed to sustainability and the transition to agroecological practices, as well as social dialogue and investment in workers and their communities.
“While the world’s top three banana exporters globally – Ecuador, the Philippines and Guatemala – all feature on the ITUCs top ten worst countries for workers, Côte d’Ivoire is among the few banana exporting nations bucking the trend, with a relatively stable rating of 3, only surpassed by Ghana and the Dominican Republic who were more highly ranked for labour conditions,” Banana Link revealed.
Côte d’Ivoire is the top banana exporter in Africa, accounting for 2 per cent of global banana exports, and the fourth biggest exporter to the EU at more than 300,000 tonnes in 2023. Key destinations include France, Belgium and the UK, countries that have already made public commitments to implement living wages in their banana supply chains.
