Amanda Camacho: Colombian Flower Worker and Union President

http://laborrightsblog.typepad.com/international_labor_right/2009/05/amanda-camacho-colombian-flower-worker-and-union-president.html

My name is Amanda Camacho, I’m a single mother and I have two adolescent boys. I have been working in the Colombian flower sector for 17 years, and I started when I was 17 years old. I’ve been at the Agricola Papagayo company for 14 years. I work in the greenhouse maintaining and cutting carnations.

We decided to form our union, Asopapagayo, an affiliate with the independent union, Untraflores, because we were tired of being disrespected and exploited by our employer. The union began on February 14, 2008, which is also Valentine’s Day and the International Day for Flower Workers, because the company were taking drastic measure to fire many of its formal, contracted workers. The company replaced many of the formal workers who had worked at the company for over ten years with temporary workers from cooperatives or other agencies who have no rights. They also gave the employees who remained more work to make up for those that got fired. They exploit the temporary workers more because they don’t have signed contracts and they don’t pay them for overtime, vacation days, or the right to medical coverage. The temporary workers are also prohibited from organizing themselves to become union members.

We started talking about forming a union because we thought we’d lose our jobs otherwise. The first union was called Sintrapapagayo. We signed a petition to get our union officially registered and brought it to the Ministry of Social Protection. The first registration was rejected because the company was corrupt and convinced the Ministry that we didn’t have all the requirements for registration. They also fired 4 of the main union leaders.

On May 17th, we decided to form ASOPAPAGAYO and began a campaign to protest the company. The Ministry of Social Protection finally approved our union on June 27. In December we handed in our petition. At that point, the company began to discriminate against the union members and took away our benefits. The Colombian government says that we have the freedom to join unions but it really isn’t true. In January of 2009, we started our negotiation with the company and after four month of intense conversations, the negotiation ended on April 13. After negotiations, we finally won union recognition and they reimbursed all the union members for all that we had lost, such as the education and nutrition benefits and our annual raise. We also gained a small increase in our salary that will last for the next two years. In our union we’re 23 women and 3 men so I want to send the message to all the women out there who are exploited that when we fight for our rights, we can be victorious in the end.