Ethical rights body Banana Link has called on farm certifiers to challenge a number of farms in Guatemala after allegations of bloody violence and poor levels of pay.

According to the organisation, violence against banana plantation workers' union leaders in Guatemala has been escalating since the murder of SITRABI union leader, Marco Tulio Ramirez, on September 23, 2007.

In early 2008, the co-founder of a new union in the south of the country plantations was also murdered. Union leaders and members in other sectors have also been victims of the increasingly generalised violence, according to Banana Link.

According to the International Trade Union Confederation’s Annual Survey of Violations of Trade Union Rights, nine trade unionists were killed in Guatemala in 2008, with trade unionists and their families increasingly becoming the targets of murder, intimidation, harassment, firearm attacks, assaults and abuse. In 2009, 16 trade unionists were murdered in the country.

Bruno Ernesto Figueroa, deputy treasurer of the national health workers' union SNTSG, died from gunshot wounds last week after being fired on by a group.

The minimum wage in Guatemala is GTQ56 (£4.60) a day with the cost of a basic household food basket estimated at GTQ3712 a month.

Alistair Smith, international co-ordinator of charity Banana Link, told freshinfo: “The government and public services are almost completely absent from the Pacific south ¬- no health clinics, no schools and no police. The area is essentially controlled by paramilitary groups, one of whose jobs is to repress any signs of plantation workers getting together to try and improve their lot.

“The focus of our work is to highlight the very serious violations of human rights in Guatemala, in particular for plantation workers trying to improve their conditions.

“Our short-term objective is to ensure that the violations are properly investigated by the government and fruit companies. However, the companies say they cannot control what happens in the plantations of local suppliers and the authorities appear to be powerless (or unwilling) to address a state of almost total impunity for the perpetrators of killings, threats and exploitative working conditions.”

He added: “In these conditions, Banana Link finds it hard to believe that certification bodies have been certifying companies against their private social and environmental standards.”

The US government recently announced a formal investigation of labour rights violations in the country under the terms of its Central America Free Trade Agreement.

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