A hefty fine of over ten thousand dollars is imposed by Turkey for a plucked wild peony, Turkish TV station Haberturk reports.
Peonies (Phylum: Magnoliophyta – Class: Equisetopsida – Order: Saxifragales – Family: Paeoniaceae), which are an endemic species in the Spil National Park, Aegean Turkey, bloom at this time of year for 10-15 days.
The plant is a protected species, and plucking it is punishable by a fine of 244,315 Turkish lira (US$10,338).
Spil Mountain in Manisa County (Turkish: Spil Dağı), the ancient Mount Sipylus, is an attraction for nature lovers, and the blooming of peonies attracts many visitors who want to admire the beautiful flower.
You walk in the door after a long day at work and your loving Saint Bernard jumps up to give you a big, slobbery kiss! Maybe you prefer your mate to greet you so heartily, but your dog always comes first! Your pet likes to greet you with jumping, tail wagging and lots of licking, while (we suspect) all you’d want yourself would rather involve the animal calmly letting you at least take off your shoes and hang up your coat.
Why do dogs jump up to meet us?
Dogs jump up to greet their beloved owners for several reasons. And for the most part, they are entirely positive.
It’s an instinct and natural behavior in four-legged friends, a tool they use to show they’re excited and happy to have you back home.
Even by the time he hears you get off the elevator or turn the key, your pet is probably already in position with a vigorous wagging tail! And rest assured, the last two, four, or eight hours must have seemed like an eternity to your furry companion before he was relieved to be home!
On the other hand, jumping up gives the dog a chance to sniff and lick your face. A gesture typical of animals of a pack, with which they greet each other when meeting. The puppies also tend to lick their mother’s face first to get her to feed them. This sign of obedience remains embedded in them throughout their lives. So it’s no wonder that since he sees you as the leader of his pack, your furry friend wants to lick your face when you come home. And without jumping, he can’t do it.
An expression of love and joy
The jumping gesture is partly dictated by pure affection, but a pinch of canine curiosity! Think about it – you’ve been out and about all day, roaming the streets, eating delicious food, meeting other people, and your pet is dying to know where you’ve been. By bringing his face close to yours, he can smell you, and so the image of your experiences is etched into his mind.
And if it has been sitting patiently at home all day, then your return is a moment of extreme excitement for the animal. Your dog associates your appearance with petting, eating, walking and playtime. And if it is obedient – with a belly rub! These are the most important moments in the life of any four-legged friend, so it is no wonder that your pet cannot hide his excitement at this prospect.
Behavioral encouragement
It’s nice to be welcomed and welcomed home, but if you have a medium to large dog, it can be uncomfortable and even problematic. Your pet can knock things out of your hands (like hot coffee or another drink), knock you over (if you’re not prepared). And even – he may take this behavior as acceptable and practice it on everyone who walks through your door, which will inevitably scare or hurt your friends.
Since dogs see this behavior as loving, you shouldn’t be harsh in rejecting it. If you don’t want your pet to jump, there are some ways to get them to stop.
For starters, start ignoring the behavior and only greet the animal when all its paws are on the ground. Avoid direct eye contact or face-to-face – come in, undress, hang up your coat, and only then enjoy your pet. The goal is to ignore unwanted behavior.
When your dog has calmed down (and all his paws are on the floor), you can greet him with the same enthusiasm with which he greets you. And if he gets overly excited again and starts jumping, repeat the steps. This may take some time, but as with any training, it is important to be consistent. Otherwise, you risk sending the animal mixed signals and will likely only make things worse.
Although greeting your dog is one of the sweetest things we can think of, it’s still important to feel comfortable when we come home and want to walk through the front door laden with bags of groceries, coffee, bag etc. For this, try to train your pet to greet you calmly, and if you encounter difficulties – do not hesitate to contact a professional trainer.
Photo by Anastasiya Lobanovskaya: https://www.pexels.com/photo/two-person-with-rings-on-ring-fingers-792775/
The news was announced by the Mexican newspaper “La Hornada”, referring to the statements of his family and friends on social networks
Vsevolod Volkov, who is the grandson of Lev Trotsky – one of the organizers of the October Revolution in 1917, died at the age of 97 in Mexico, the Mexican newspaper “Hornada” reported, citing statements by his family and friends on social media networks.
Volkov was born in the former Soviet Union in 1926, and in 1939, together with his grandfather Leon Trotsky, he arrived in Mexico, where he studied chemistry. In 1990, the grandson turned the family home in the Mexican capital into a house-museum of Trotsky, writes in “Hornada”. The newspaper notes that Volkov was the last witness to the assassination of Trotsky in 1940 in Mexico.
Shortly before Lenin’s death in 1924, an internal power struggle began in the Leon Trotskyof Russia, in which Leon Trotsky was defeated. In November 1927 he was expelled from the party, and in 1929 he was expelled from the former Soviet Union. In 1932, Trotsky was also deprived of his then Soviet citizenship, TASS recalls.
In 1937, Trotsky received political asylum in Mexico, from where he sharply criticized Stalin’s policies. It soon became known that his assassination was being prepared by agents of the then Soviet intelligence. On May 24, 1940, the first assassination attempt was made on Trotsky, but he survived. On August 20, 1940, however, the secret agent of the then People’s Commissariat of the Interior, Ramon Mercader, a pro-Stalinist Spanish communist who had been introduced in the 1930s in his immediate environment, came to visit him and managed to kill him at his home in the Mexican capital.
Trotsky knew that he was a constant target for Stalin, and that he would be hunted down with a vengeance. He predicted that there would be further attempts to take his life, and he was right. What Trotsky didn’t expect was that an odd fellow named Ramón Mercader, who was living under the pseudonym Jacques Mornard and was dating Trotsky’s secretary Sylvia Ageloff, would be the one to finally kill him. Mercader pretended to sympathize with and support Trotsky’s views so as to not seem suspicious or raise any cause for concern.
On August 20, 1940, Trotsky was back to his daily routine of enjoying nature and writing about politics. Mercader had asked to meet with him that evening to show him an article about James Burnham and Max Shachtman. Trotsky obliged, though Natalia notes that he would have rather stayed in the garden, feeding the rabbits or left to himself; Trotsky always found Mercader to be a bit off and irritating. Natalia accompanied the two men to Trotsky’s study and left them there. She found it bizarre that Mercader was wearing a raincoat in the middle of summer. When she asked him why he was wearing it along with rainboots, he replied curtly, (and for Natalia, absurdly), “because it might rain.” No one knew at the time that the murder weapon, the ice axe, was concealed underneath the raincoat. Within a matter of minutes, a piercing and terrifying cry could be heard from the next room over.
Photo: Leon Trotsky, photographed c.1918. Rijksmuseum.
The destruction earlier this month of the Soviet-era dam and hydroelectric plant in an area reportedly under Russian control since its invasion in 2022, has caused widespread flooding across southern Ukraine, washing away homes, destroying sanitation and sewage systems and crippling water supplies.
In a statement, Humanitarian Coordinator Denise Brown vowed that the UN would press on with relief efforts, “and do all it can to reach all people – including those suffering as a result of the recent dam destruction – who urgently need life-saving assistance, no matter where they are.”
The UN would also continue to engage to seek the necessary access.
“We urge the Russian authorities to act in accordance with their obligations under international humanitarian law,” she said, adding: “Aid cannot be denied to people who need it.”
The emptying of Kakhovka Reservoir has left tens of thousands of people in southern Ukraine without access to piped water, mainly in the Dnipro region.
The reservoir – one of the largest in Europe – is reportedly 70 per cent empty, according to Ukrainian authorities.
The width of the reservoir has also decreased from three kilometres to one, while the water level is now at around seven meters, well below the 12-metre operational threshold, the UN’s main humanitarian coordination wing, known as OCHA, reported at the end of last week.
Hate speech reinforces discrimination and stigma and is most often aimed at women, refugees and migrants, and minorities. If left unchecked, it can even harm peace and development, as it lays the ground for conflicts and tensions, wide scale human rights violations.
To turn back the rising tide of hate, the United Nations is marking the International Day for Countering Hate Speech by calling on everyone to work together to build a more respectful and civil world, and for effective action to end this toxic and destructive phenomenon.
UN Secretary-General António Guterres also warns that misguided and ambiguous responses to hate speech – including blanket bans and internet shutdowns – may also violate human rights by restricting freedom of speech and expression.
Similarly, the top UN human rights official, Volker Türk, says that the spread of hate speech-related laws being misused against journalists and human rights defenders is almost as viral as the spread of hate speech itself.
In his message on the Day, he stresses that broad laws – that license States to censor speech they find uncomfortable and to threaten or detain those who question Government policy or criticize officials – violate rights and endanger essential public debate.
“Rather than criminalizing protected speech, we need States and companies to take urgent steps to address incitement to hatred and violence,” Mr. Türk says.
‘Amplify voices that cut through the hate’
But we are far from powerless in the face of hate speech, says Mr. Guterres, stressing that “we can and must raise awareness about its dangers, and work to prevent and end it in all its forms.”
He cites the United Nations Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech as the Organization’s comprehensive framework for tackling the causes and impacts of hate speech, and notes that the world body’s offices and teams around the world are confronting hate speech by implementing local action plans, based on this strategy.
“The United Nations is consulting governments, technology companies and others on a voluntary Code of Conduct for information integrity on digital platforms, aimed at reducing the spread of mis- and disinformation and hate speech, while protecting freedom of expression,” he adds.
Mr. Türk, the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, calls for a range of actions – from education initiatives and investing in digital literacy programmes to listening to those most effective by hate speech and holding companies to their human rights obligations.
“More also needs to be done to address mega-spreaders – those officials and influencers whose voices have profound impact and whose examples inspire thousands of others,” Mr. Türk said. “We must build networks and amplify voices that can cut through the hate.”
The Bar Council is profoundly concerned by recent announcements in parts of Pakistan that Ahmadi Muslims lawyers must renounce their religion in order to practise at the Bar. Both the District Bar Association of Gujranwala and the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Bar Council issued notices that anyone applying for admittance to the Bar must positively assert they are Muslim and denounce the teachings of the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community and its founder Mirza Ghulam Ahmad.
The Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Pakistan enshrines the principles of religious freedom and equality before the law and it is difficult to see how the notices can be consistent with that principle.
Nick Vineall KC, Chair of the Bar of England and Wales, has written to the chair of the Pakistan Bar Council requesting that action be taken to remedy this discrimination against Ahmadi Muslims and non-Muslims.
According to news reports from The Friday Times, Ahmadi Muslims have also faced physical attacks in court. In a judgment from the High Court of Sindh Karachi, Omar Sial J. said: “Not only an attempt was made to intimidate the court and interfere in the smooth administration of justice, but a lawyer… was physically abusive towards… one of the learned counsel for the applicant. […] This was simply unacceptable behaviour and conduct and must necessarily be condemned by the Bar Associations and Councils.”
Commenting, Chair of the Bar Council of England and Wales Nick Vineall KC, said:
“There is understandably a huge amount of international political focus on Pakistan at the moment. Amid these wider concerns over democratic processes, we have been alerted to the specific concerns of Ahmadi Muslim lawyers who are facing discrimination in being denied the right to practise at the Bar because of their religion.
“The decisions taken in Gujranwala and Khyber Pakhtunkhwa to exclude Ahmadi Muslims and non-Muslims from the Bar – and by extension, potentially excluding citizens from access to legal representation – are intentionally discriminatory and seem impossible to reconcile with Pakistan’s constitutional principles of religious freedom and equality before the law.
“We are urging the Bar Council of Pakistan, as the overarching body, to take action.”
On 6 August 1890, a form of execution called the electric chair was used for the first time in the United States. The first person executed was William Kemmler. Nine years later, in 1899, the first woman, Martha M. Place, was executed in Sing Sing Prison.
But it was not until 45 years later, in 1944, that a 14-year-old boy named George Stinney was executed. This young black man was found guilty of murdering two girls and was immediately condemned by an all-white court to die a brutal death in the electric chair. The most curious thing is that this brutal attack on human rights had its epilogue in 2014 when an appeal court, thanks to a black rights organisation, which had the evidence of that case reviewed, declared him innocent, not not not guilty, but innocent.
In the late 1980s, working as a documentary filmmaker, I had the opportunity to participate in a documentary on forms of death and among them, one of the most shocking was undoubtedly to see the process by which a person was seated in a chair and his limbs were tied to the chair with straps. Then a splint was placed in his mouth so that he would not swallow his tongue and choke during the convulsions, his eyes were closed, gauze or cotton wool was placed over them, and then the adhesive tape was applied so that they would remain closed.
On top of his head, a helmet connected with wires to an electric net and finally the terrible torture of frying him was put into practice. His body temperature would rise to over 60 degrees and, after suffering terrible convulsions, having to relieve himself and experiencing a series of vomiting which, due to the splint and a kind of strap attached to his chin, left only a white foam peeping out of the corners of his mouth, he would die. This was considered a humane death, given that at the end of the 19th century, it replaced hanging, which was apparently atrocious.
Today the practice is no longer used, although some American states, including South Carolina, often give it as an option to prisoners. There is no evidence of its use today, although similar methods are used in some of the documented tortures carried out by central intelligence or terrorist movements around the world. Torture by alternating or direct current is still among the top ten most commonly used methods.
In other words, the use of electricity as a form of death or torture to obtain information is basically already classified as a human rights offence all over the world, including the most radical countries on earth, which often sign the various United Nations charters condemning such practices.
Why, then, does an army of psychiatrists throughout the world persist in continuing a practice that has been condemned by many of their colleagues, in contravention of the guidelines and recommendations of the World Health Organisation, the United Nations and even the various organisations linked to the European Union in this field? What are they trying to prove?
In 1975, in the Oregon State Hospital in Salem, a psychiatric hospital that still exists today, the interiors of one of the most iconic films in history were shot: Someone Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest. A cult film, it is ranked 33rd out of the 100 best films of the 20th century. This is not the place to develop the plot, but it takes us into the life of a psychiatric hospital where electroconvulsive therapies are carried out in the 1960s.
The plot is set in 1965 and depicts the treatment of the patients in the centre. Violent nurses, are obsessed with controlling the patients. Doctors who use them for experiments and above all to suppress what they consider to be their aggressiveness. Electroconvulsion and especially its first cousin lobotomy are part, in this film, of what the psychiatric class used to do at that time, and even many years later.
In the end, the scene, which is still repeated today in many parts of the world, is always the same. The patient is treated like a prisoner, he is deprived of any possibility of having a say in what is going to happen to him, and it is a judge, playing Pilate, who washes his hands of a simple sheet of paper stating that this subject, this person, is mentally ill and that he needs this therapy, according to the psychiatrist on duty.
They are sat in a chair, or laid on a stretcher, unheeding, if they are relatively conscious and not crammed with antidepressants and tranquilisers, and electrodes are attached to the skin of their head, through which current is supplied, without knowing what the therapy will produce. A piece is even placed in their mouths to prevent them from swallowing their tongues so that the current can be applied without remorse.
Yes, there are studies that speak of a certain improvement among patients with severe clinical depression, even in some cases the figures are as high as 64%. Likewise, in states of violent schizophrenia, it seems that the personality of these patients improves and they are not so aggressive. And so it is possible to live with them. They are patients condemned for life to aggressive electroconvulsive therapy, most of them with no say in the appropriateness of their treatment. It is always others who decide, but what does the patient want?
In the face of these infrequent studies, mostly carried out in psychiatric environments, paid for by pharmaceutical industries eager to sell psychotropic drugs, the failures are ignored, hundreds of thousands of people with whom this therapy has been used over the last few years, without any results. Such figures are never published. Why?
The gaps in the mind, the loss of memory, the loss of speech, motor problems in some cases, and above all the enslavement to antipsychotic drugs are really a scourge which, despite the efforts of organisations denouncing such practices, are to no avail.
In the United States, or in the European Union, when this type of aggressive and denounceable therapy, medical tortures, are applied, in short, anaesthesia is usually applied to the patient. It is called therapy with modifications. However, in other countries, for example in Russia, only 20% of patients undergo this practice with a relaxing treatment. And then in countries such as Japan, China, India, Thailand, Turkey, and other countries where, although it is used, there is no statistical data on the subject, it is still practised in the old way.
Electroconvulsion is, above all, a technique that violates the human rights of individuals, including those who at a given moment may appear to need it. Also, without there being a general study, which would be very interesting, I believe that more and more of this technique has been used in psychiatric hospitals all over the world for the annulment of people, in order to carry out studies on patients who are a nuisance. People who hardly mean anything to society and who can be made dispensable.
Have all psychiatric practices always been used for the benefit of society, or rather for the benefit of a few large companies?
The questions go on and on and, in general, psychiatrists do not have any answers. Even when, after the trial of success-error they carry out their electroconvulsive therapies, and this provides them with something like an interesting response, they are able to obtain a meagre improvement in the patient, nothing definitive; they do not know how to explain the reason for this improvement. There are no answers, the good or bad that it can produce is unknown. And all that can be said is that patients are used as guinea pigs. No psychiatrist in the world is going to guarantee that such a practice can reverse any of the alleged disorders for which it is used. No psychiatrist in the world. And if not, I encourage them to ask in writing for the real benefits of taking pills or applying some kind of aggressive therapy that they might recommend.
On the other hand, and to conclude, many of the people who come to be diagnosed as patients of interest to receive electric shocks to the brain have been treated with antipsychotic or antidepressant drugs, even crammed with anxiolytics. In short, their brains have been bombarded with medication, the contraindications of which are often more serious than the small problem they are trying to solve.
It is clear that societies that constantly manufacture diseases also need to generate medication for them. It is the perfect circle, turning society, the people who make it up, into mentally ill people, in general, making us chronic patients so that they can take the pill that will save our minds to our nearest drug dispensary. Perhaps, at this point, I would like to ask the question that many medical experts, some of them honest psychiatrists, are asking themselves: Are we all mentally ill? Are we creating fictitious mental illnesses?
The answer to the first question is NO; to the second question, it is Yes.
Source: Electroshock: necessary treatment or psychiatric abuse? – BBC News World And others.
Conference held by COMECE, L’Oeuvre d’Orient and Aid to the Church in Need (The European Times)
Christians in Syria are doomed to disappear within two decades if the international community does not develop specific policies to protect them.
This was the call for urgent assistance from Christian Syrian activists who had come to Brussels to testify at the conference organized by the COMECE, L’Oeuvre d’Orient and Aid to the Church in Need on the eve of the 7th Brussels EU Conference “Supporting the future of Syria and the region.”
The event titled “Syria – Humanitarian and Development Challenges of Faith-Based Actors: a Christian Perspective” also gave the floor online to representatives of Christian humanitarian and social projects in Syria.
In this 13th year of war, Christians are among the 97% of the global population who live below the poverty line but in addition the demographic erosion of their community looks irreversible. A few alarming data.
In Aleppo, 2/3 of Christian families have ‘disappeared’ from the radars: there are only 11,500 left now against 37,000 in 2010.
Each Christian family is only composed of 2.5 persons due to the decreasing birth rate which can be explained by the massive migration of young couples and the lack of a future to be built in Syria for a possible next generation.
Moreover, according to some statistics, about 40% of the remaining families are headed by women but they have fewer job opportunities than men.
The average age of the members of the Christian community is 47 years. As it is steadily rising, this trend will lead to an increasingly ageing community doomed to become less and less dynamic and to die slowly without descendants.
In addition, the devastating earthquake in February and the unabated egregious violations of human rights have further aggravated their situation.
For the moment, there is no light at the end of their tunnel although young Christians are ready to take up the challenge, but funding is needed to build a future, some Syrian Christians said at the conference.
No regime change no reconstruction, the EU says
On 15 June, the EU High Representative/ Vice-President Josep Borrell said at the 7th Conference:
“The European policy on Syria has not changed. We will not re-establish full diplomatic relations with the Assad regime, or start working on reconstruction, until a genuine and comprehensive political transition is firmly under way – which is not the case. As long as there is no progress – and for the time being there is no progress – we will maintain the sanctions regime. Sanctions that target the regime and its supporters, and not the Syrian people.”
Josep Borrell
In the Catholic Church, some think that a lot of attention is disproportionately devoted to the sanctions targeting the 3% elite while not enough is efficiently being done to guarantee the present and the future of the poor population (97%).
The United States and the European Union have stopped to be credible political players in Syria since September 2013 when former U.S. President Obama finally failed to resort to military intervention, despite his verbal threats, after Assad used chemical weapons against his own population. This unpunished crossing of the American red line had then resulted in the unavoidable withdrawal of President Hollande from any military joint operation. The vacuum was quickly replaced by Russia and now Assad’s Syria has just been reintegrated in the Arab League.
Some in the Catholic Church firmly contend the position that reconstruction is a priority to keep Syrians of all faiths and ethnicities on their historical lands and should not be indefinitely subjected to an illusory political change in Damas. They consider that reconstruction can be carried out without legitimizing Assad’s regime. Such voices need to be listened to and their options to be examined.
Foreign and international humanitarian Christian institutions have their relays in Syria. They can activate their human and logistical capacities to serve the Syrian population in its global diversity. They are reliable partners which meet transparency and justice requirements.
The tiny Christian minority is a chance for Syria because they can have a significant impact on the improvement of the daily life of all Syrians. The EU and other donors should bet on it because Syrians deserve to get a chance to live in dignity.
The 7th Brussels EU Conference
VII Brussels Conference “Supporting the Future of Syria and the region” (EEAS)
The high-level ministerial segment of the conference gathered representatives of 57 countries on 14-15 June, including EU member states and over 30 international organisations, including the United Nations, in addition to the EU institutions.
The 7th Conference, which claims to be the main pledging event for Syria and the region in 2023, succeeded in mobilising aid to Syrians inside the country and in the neighbouring countries, through international pledges totalling €5.6 billion for 2023 and beyond, including €4.6 billion for 2023 and €1 billion for 2024 and beyond.
Christians from the charity “Hope” in Syria testifying in Brussels (The European Times)
The pledges cover the humanitarian needs of Syrians inside Syria, and also support for early recovery and resilience, helping Syrians to rebuild their country and covering the needs of 5.7 million Syrian refugees in the hosting countries, in the neighbourhood: Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan, Egypt and Iraq, as well as the needs of the communities who generously provide them shelter.
From 2011 to date, the European Union and its member states have been the largest donors of humanitarian and resilience assistance to Syria and the region with over €30 billion but they are no longer local political and geo-political players.
Christians in Syria hope that their inclusive educative, social and humanitarian projects will benefit at their fair value from this financial windfall. Only time will tell.
Parliament calls for an annual ‘European day for the victims of the global climate crises’ to be established to remember the human lives lost due to climate change.
In the resolution, adopted with 395 votes to 109 and 31 abstentions on Thursday, Parliament proposes to hold this day annually -starting this year on 15 July 2023- and invites the Council and the Commission to back the initiative.
MEPs say it is appropriate to commemorate the victims of the climate crises and highlight that it would help to raise awareness of the human lives lost and humanitarian crisis caused by climate change.
They point out that climate change is leading to more unpredictable weather phenomena, including more frequent and intense heatwaves, wildfires and floods, to threats to food, water safety and security, and to the emergence and spread of infectious diseases, which are intensifying and taking an ever-greater human toll both globally and in Europe.
Background
Parliament has adopted the European Climate Law, which obliges the EU by law to become climate neutral by 2050 and to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions by at least 55% in 2030. Parliament has also recently adopted key laws as part of the ‘Fit for 55’-package in order to reach that target. On 29 November 2019, Parliament declared a climate and environmental emergency in Europe and globally.
Kenyan tea pickers destroy machines brought in to replace them in violent protests that highlight the challenge facing workers as more agribusiness companies rely on automation to cut costs, reports Semafor Africa.
According to local media reports, at least 10 tea picking machines have been set on fire during protests over the past year. In the latest demonstrations, one protester was killed and several people were injured, including 23 police officers and farm workers. The Kenya Tea Growers Association (KTGA) estimated the value of the destroyed machinery at $1.2 million after nine machines belonging to Ekaterra, maker of the best-selling Lipton tea brand, were destroyed in May.
In March, a local government task force recommended that tea companies in Kericho, the largest city that hosts many of the country’s tea plantations, adopt a new ratio of 60:40 between mechanized and manual tea picking. The task force also wants legislation to be passed to restrict the importation of tea picking machinery. Nicholas Kirui, a member of the task force and former CEO of KTGA, tells Semafor Africa that in Kericho County alone, 30,000 jobs have been lost to mechanization in the last decade.
“We held public hearings in all the counties and with all the different groups, and the overwhelming opinion we heard was that the machines should go,” Kirui says.
In 2021, Kenya exported $1.2 billion worth of tea, making it the third largest tea exporter in the world, after China and Sri Lanka. Multinational companies including Browns Investments, George Williamson and Ekaterra – which was sold by Unilever to a private equity firm in July 2022 – plant tea on about 200,000 acres in Kericho and have all adopted mechanized harvesting.
Some machines are reported to be able to replace 100 workers. Ekaterra’s director of corporate affairs in Kenya, Sammy Kirui, says mechanization is “critical” to the company’s operations and the global competitiveness of Kenyan tea. As the government task force has found, a machine can reduce the cost of picking tea to 3 cents per kilogram compared to 11 cents per kilogram for hand picking.
Analysts partly attribute Kenya’s unemployment rate – the highest in East Africa – to the automation of industries including banking and insurance. In the last quarter of 2022, about 13.9% of Kenyans of working age (above 16) were unemployed or long-term unemployed.
Automation will only continue to develop at breakneck speed not only in rural Kenya, but also in other sectors of countries in Africa – especially with the spread of artificial intelligence. Anger in tea-picking areas may be just an early sign of future tensions if governments and companies do not find ways to help workers.
The majority of tea pickers are young, many are women, and often lack the opportunities and skills to develop outside the tea sector. Retraining farm workers, as well as creating more jobs and diversifying the economies of tea-growing communities, will be key to countering the violence and growing anger.
“My ministry is committed to opening up the labor market to increase employment opportunities for Kenyans,” Labor Cabinet Secretary Florence Bore said on a trip to Kericho, days after the latest wave of protests in May. She added that efforts are being made to resolve the dispute between local residents and tea companies.
The private sector can also play a role in retraining workers. Kirui shared that Ekaterra is keen to partner with local communities on projects involving technical and vocational education and training centres.
Mechanization makes business sense for tea growers and they are unlikely to give up the tea picking machines that reduce their costs. But the trend is likely to continue to hurt rural communities, where farm workers are central to economic activity. Workers and residents will continue to resist these changes as they have no alternative employment options.
The largest exporter of tea in the world is China. In an article calling for more efficient mechanization of tea picking in China, published in March, Wu Luofa of the Institute of Agricultural Engineering at the Jiangxi Academy of Agricultural Sciences notes that manual tea picking represents more than the half of the cost of tea production.
“The development and promotion of tea picking machines is beneficial to increase labor productivity, reduce labor costs, increase the market competitiveness of tea products and promote the sustainable development of the tea industry,” he said.
According to Tabitha Njuguna, managing director of African Commodity Exchange AFEX in Kenya, the introduction of technology and mechanization is key to unlocking the potential of agriculture in Africa and should therefore be embraced despite the discontent of some workers.
“We find that the potential disruptions caused by the integration of technology and mechanization may seem initially threatening, but it is important that all stakeholders (agricultural organizations, farmers, processors) involved see them as increasingly inevitable she tells Semafor Africa.
In February, a BBC documentary revealed widespread sexual harassment and abuse on tea farms in Kericho, with 70 women being abused by their managers on plantations run by British companies Unilever and James Finlay.
