I was on a field trip today on work related functions, tulikua izi Tea growing side za Nandi County.
Tulikua kwa Tea estate moja, and our target population was the tea pickers, but they were nowhere to be seen in the institution we were expecting them, save for one or two popping by briefly then quickly making an exit as if being chased. So I got curious and asked one of the locals there what was going on. The response I got really shook my outlook on work life in Kenya.
As narrated; these tea pickers start work at 6.30am and have a target of picking a minimum of 35 kgs of tea, they are obviously supervised to enforce this and can work upto six in the evening! Imagine standing while you work your fingers numb for close to 12 hours! That is not all, you cannot just abscond work even for valid reasons such as falling ill, that is unacceptable, unless if you fell ill while working, you may not stop picking tea just because it is raining, unless it starts raining hailstones!
I know I did not need to see others suffer to appreciate what I have, but men, do some people have it rough in life.
*note, they get paid like, 14ksh per kg of tea. That translates to approx 500ksh per day.
*Bright side: some tea estates provide housing and health care for their “slaves”.
At least wananukisha kitunguu which is more than can be said of guys who rely on their parents as adults
That is the only consolation I gave myself despite what they had to go through.
Can you imagine they get more than the tea farmers?
Labour laws in kenya are crap.
Poor babies
Atwoli is their representative. Umewai-mwuona kwa tea farm in his designer suits and jewellery hata siku moja? Ama kwa flower farm hata moja? Kazi ni kudance tu Nairobi na siasa za ujinga.
In some tea farms they still practice colonial caning and other brutal punishments.
Nation did an expose on tea farms in the 2000s and the brutality in that story… nilishindwa if we really have independence. It involved a young girl recounting what goes on in her tea farm at night. Huko hata journalist hawezi ingia ati ni investigation anafanya, those supervisors will kill you and burry you. But of course this being Kenya Atwoli na police walitoa silly statements on ongoing hinifestigashons… na story ikasahaulika since Kenyan journalists don’t do follow ups anyway. 12 years a slave iko very alive hapa Kenya. They bury slaves in those farms. And the children are born slaves. Indentured for life, hakuna kusoma.
Ketepa Pride! I like black tea with lemon.
I’ll remember this next time while re-stocking. Fucking disgusting.
I once visited a coffee estate in Ruiru and I didn’t like what I saw. the coffee was irrigated daily but the workers who live on the estate fetched their water from the river…
An awareness campaign can curb this, particularly in international tea markets that sustain the demand. Buuut, they are also running to China for the cheap labour and slave-like conditions. China meanwhile, is becoming a developed nation and it’s citizens are shunning these deplorable labour set ups. So, they send their excess here and have plans of setting up those labour intensive low paying factories huku - Africa has an excess of cheap labour. We do the work but the money goes to China. Soon , we’ll be everyone’s slave.
Are you being serious? Ati canning?
Say what? Law is not the problem here.
desperation ndio inafanya watu waingie hizo job, mseh anapiga hesabu ya hiyo mia tano kila siku na anajua hana any other skills anaona tu aichangamkie
True. Even those ones are well protected in the law. Unless kama hawajui haki zao. Of course lazima there are rogue union officials who might want to conspire with employers.