The director of a new documentary claims it exposes the UK supermarkets' unfair treatment of African banana workers.

Filmmaker Jan Nimmo says that Cameroon's banana pickers, some paid as little as £2.25 a day for bananas that are sold in UK supermarkets for an average of 10p, are among the lowest paid in the world.

Nimmo spent a week in the country's Fako region, which supplies the bananas to several of the UK's major supermarkets, to film for her short film, Portraits From Cameroon.

She said: “There were pregnant women unfolding blue bags which are used to protect bananas from pests. The bags are coated with a chemical called chlorpyrifos which can cause numbness, weight loss, birth defects, loss of libido, respiratory problems and suicidal thoughts.'

The banana industry is the fifth-largest export earner in Cameroon, employing over 46,000 staff, and charity Banana Link, which helped fund Nimmo's trip, says the price wars British supermarkets have engaged in are making it impossible for many of the country's plantation workers to earn enough to live on.

“Research shows workers earn about one third of what they need to live on, and conditions will never be good until supermarkets pay more for bananas,' explained Jacqui Mackay of Banana Link.

Many of Cameroon's banana pickers work for CDC, the largest private employer network in the African country, with international exporter Del Monte buying and marketing the CDC bananas that are exported into the UK market.

The film, which also looks at the treatment of banana pickers in Ecuador, can be found on Nimmo's website.

Del Monte were unable to comment before FPJ went to press.

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