Chiquita Bananas and Climate Justice: On June 12 Democracy Now aired a segment on a legal victory for Colombian agricultural workers against Chiquita. After years of legal wrangling, the banana giant was ordered to pay $38 million to families of banana workers who were harassed, tortured and assassinated by paramilitaries financed by the food corporation. Workers were targeted for their efforts to organize and resist low pay and dangerous working conditions. But many in the local climate justice movement were dismayed by the coverage for the failure to make the connections to the environmental devastation caused by banana monoculture. Today on the mole we have with us Lynn Spitaleri Handlin, a local climate justice activist, to talk about media coverage, or lack thereof, of critical issues of environmental and climate justice. They also discuss the specifics of climate and environmental harms of the banana giant.
Chiquita Banana display. Photo by Mike Mozart and licensed for public use: https://www.flickr.com/photos/jeepersmedia/26115244513