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human rights improvements. Our world this week is set in Guatemala. | :00:07. | :00:17. | |
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This is the story of two worlds that straddle a beautiful land. It | :00:19. | :00:29. | |
:00:29. | :00:29. | ||
is about sugar and inequality. Hope and the unknown. Who are these | :00:29. | :00:35. | |
people coming up to us? So duty. you think we should go? There is a | :00:35. | :00:45. | |
:00:45. | :00:47. | ||
lot of violence. People heard people. It is about how selling | :00:47. | :00:56. | |
Sugar might make things Ferrer and safer. We welcome any meant Bach's | :00:56. | :01:01. | |
-- Denmark's and anything that leads to maturity. It is also a | :01:01. | :01:11. | |
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story about the children of the We are flying due south of | :01:38. | :01:43. | |
Guatemala City to one of the world's most modern ports, -- | :01:43. | :01:53. | |
modern boards. We meet Jose A Reeve, a man with a vision. He represents | :01:53. | :02:03. | |
:02:03. | :02:16. | ||
the sugar industry of Central Guatemala is rich in agriculture | :02:16. | :02:21. | |
and resources. But society is corrupt and violent. People are | :02:21. | :02:31. | |
:02:31. | :02:38. | ||
poor and hungry. The government is We have flown 40 minutes out of the | :02:38. | :02:42. | |
capital. They are about to land at the shipping terminal specially- | :02:42. | :02:49. | |
built to export sugar. His belief is that trade is the key to | :02:49. | :02:59. | |
:02:59. | :03:01. | ||
building strong democracy. Nearby is a milk owned by Pantaleon, the | :03:01. | :03:08. | |
biggest sugar company in Central America. -- and mill. Rock, freshly | :03:08. | :03:13. | |
harvested sugar-cane enters its first stage of processing. Tens of | :03:13. | :03:23. | |
:03:23. | :03:25. | ||
thousands of people rely on it for It has been in the sugar business | :03:25. | :03:35. | |
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since 1849. since 1849.t how There has now been a landmark | :03:54. | :03:58. | |
international deal that puts these grains of sugar under the closest | :03:58. | :04:07. | |
of scrutiny. It's between the 27 countries of the European Union and | :04:07. | :04:14. | |
the six of Central America and its the first of its kind. -- it is the | :04:15. | :04:24. | |
:04:25. | :04:30. | ||
first. I feel proud. I feel proud because the productivity that my | :04:30. | :04:34. | |
family dedicated itself to is helping the country have an | :04:34. | :04:38. | |
opportunity for growth. In the case of sugar, it has been taken to such | :04:38. | :04:44. | |
levels of efficiency. Central America can now sell sugar and | :04:44. | :04:52. | |
other food to the European Union and get a higher price. To achieve | :04:52. | :04:58. | |
that, it must co-operate on for more than just product quality. On | :04:58. | :05:04. | |
sensitive issues like human rights and corruption. In short, the | :05:04. | :05:08. | |
European agreement is about how the rich share with the poor and how | :05:09. | :05:18. | |
:05:19. | :05:19. | ||
people are treated. We will create growth, growth that | :05:19. | :05:27. | |
is sustainable and respecting human rights and democracy. You welcome | :05:27. | :05:31. | |
the fact that that is part of the trade agreement? Sure. You cannot | :05:31. | :05:39. | |
develop a country without that. We need to have sustainable economic | :05:39. | :05:49. | |
:05:49. | :05:50. | ||
growth. And we understand it is very hard to have a stable | :05:50. | :06:00. | |
:06:00. | :06:04. | ||
government without economic growth. We have to work together. | :06:05. | :06:09. | |
The history of sugar is far from sweet. It is a story of slavery and | :06:09. | :06:15. | |
cheap migrant labour. Back in the 18th century, the writer Voltaire | :06:15. | :06:20. | |
described appalling injuries to workers as the price they paid for | :06:20. | :06:30. | |
:06:30. | :06:34. | ||
For a very long time, low wages and dangerous conditions had given rich | :06:34. | :06:44. | |
:06:44. | :06:56. | ||
-- have given rich countries. The work might look the same. Things | :06:56. | :07:03. | |
are different in this particular field. These cutters work for the | :07:03. | :07:12. | |
big international sugar exporter Pantaleon. It employs 25,000 people. | :07:12. | :07:19. | |
In the harvest season, thousands of cane cutters. They earn about $500 | :07:19. | :07:29. | |
:07:29. | :07:34. | ||
a month. That is far above the Dima Saliva tells me he has been | :07:34. | :07:43. | |
working the field since 1983. It is hard and filthy. Much has changed. | :07:43. | :07:48. | |
He has access to health care and a pension fund and has given safety | :07:48. | :07:58. | |
equipment, goggles, gloves, leg guards. The hour was a shorter and, | :07:58. | :08:05. | |
for the company, more Keane is cut. -- sugar-cane. The cost of looking | :08:05. | :08:12. | |
after them pays for itself many times. US. It pays a lot. Does | :08:12. | :08:18. | |
everybody understand that in the sugar industry? Yes. It is a well- | :08:18. | :08:23. | |
known situation. The tools of the trade might be from another age. | :08:23. | :08:27. | |
The machete is not much different from when Guatemala's for stew | :08:27. | :08:34. | |
refinery opened in 1591. -- first sugar refinery. Life is far from | :08:34. | :08:41. | |
easy but the conditions are well within international law. The | :08:41. | :08:47. | |
industry is straining to achieve a more competitive, sustainable model. | :08:47. | :08:53. | |
It does not respond to people. That means -- model but response to | :08:53. | :08:57. | |
people. Wait to work on providing people with better opportunities | :08:57. | :09:02. | |
for them and future generations through quality training and jobs | :09:02. | :09:06. | |
and respect. Internationally, we want to keep growing. We want to | :09:06. | :09:11. | |
keep securing a place where we achieve what we want because of | :09:11. | :09:21. | |
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efficiency and doing things the right way. | :09:23. | :09:32. | |
That was the story of hope. Now we try not more than two hours away to | :09:32. | :09:36. | |
another world for a first glance -- where, at first glance, it doesn't | :09:36. | :09:45. | |
look that different. Julio is a trade union official. Augusto as an | :09:45. | :09:50. | |
activist who knows the cane fields well. He was put to work when he | :09:50. | :09:55. | |
was just 11 years old. They want to show us the dark side of the sugar | :09:55. | :10:00. | |
industry. That is where we are heading. | :10:00. | :10:10. | |
:10:10. | :10:21. | ||
These are migrant workers, casual His name is Michael. Sadly, Augusto | :10:21. | :10:31. | |
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That's about $60 every two weeks. About 500,000, one in six of | :11:10. | :11:14. | |
Guatemala's children like Michael, or working. The man with him said | :11:14. | :11:24. | |
:11:24. | :11:58. | ||
If Wright, they make just a quarter what the Pantaleon cutters were | :11:58. | :12:08. | |
:12:08. | :12:08. | ||
Apology for the loss of subtitles for 40 seconds | :12:08. | :12:48. | |
getting and the hours are much Then, we were interrupted. Who are | :12:48. | :12:53. | |
these people coming up to us now? Security. Private security. | :12:53. | :13:02. | |
think we should go? Yes. Things aren't that straight forward. All | :13:02. | :13:10. | |
handshakes, formal ones. It turns out there from a nearby mill. | :13:10. | :13:14. | |
Enough of a presence to prompt a quick departure from Michael, his | :13:14. | :13:19. | |
father and the cane cutters. They have not come to stop us filming or | :13:19. | :13:29. | |
:13:29. | :14:06. | ||
to monitor child labour but to Then they left. But so had Mike | :14:06. | :14:16. | |
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Hall. These guys here don't know where they have gone, do they? -- | :14:18. | :14:25. | |
Michael. Apparently he was in the next field. So we went to find him. | :14:25. | :14:30. | |
The use of children, the uncontrolled burning, the lack of | :14:30. | :14:38. | |
safety measures... the mainstream industry who we were with before | :14:38. | :14:42. | |
say sugar 1/2 this could this way could never be sold to Europe. -- | :14:42. | :14:46. | |
harvested. Their cheques are too rigorous. The European Commission | :14:46. | :14:52. | |
told me it was impossible to be completely certain. But it expected | :14:52. | :14:59. | |
Guatemalan not to break the law and to abide by its promises. -- | :14:59. | :15:04. | |
Guatemala. Augusto's sceptical that Europe can change anything here. We | :15:04. | :15:09. | |
think we have found the field where Mike Hall is working. Augusto | :15:09. | :15:13. | |
interrupts the cane cutters lunch to ask where he might be. -- | :15:13. | :15:20. | |
Michael. Then the foreman arrives and tells them to get back to work | :15:20. | :15:27. | |
immediately. "Don't argue, just do it," He says. All in good humour, | :15:27. | :15:34. | |
but they get ready. Augusto asks him when he actually started | :15:34. | :15:44. | |
:15:44. | :16:12. | ||
We find Michael nearby. Hard at work just as he described. But not | :16:12. | :16:20. | |
only him but another child's there. There's no sense among the cutters | :16:20. | :16:24. | |
that this is indeed all wrong. Even the security guys from the other | :16:24. | :16:30. | |
male admitted it was going on, but didn't try to stop it. -- meal. | :16:30. | :16:40. | |
:16:40. | :16:50. | ||
Next to the cane fie village of Las Flores. -- is. | :16:50. | :16:57. | |
Unpaid and poor sanitation. A sugar mill has not yet materialised here. | :16:57. | :17:02. | |
That afternoon we reflected on the lives of Michael and children like | :17:02. | :17:12. | |
:17:12. | :17:35. | ||
For parents that creeping threat is always a worry. With no real sense | :17:35. | :17:45. | |
:17:45. | :17:50. | ||
Have any of you guys met any body from the European Union, or any | :17:50. | :17:58. | |
body that some monitoring the cane For generations there's been a | :17:58. | :18:02. | |
sense that the system will never deliver for them. Historically in | :18:02. | :18:07. | |
Latin America it's fuelled rebellion, creating legends such as | :18:07. | :18:17. | |
:18:17. | :18:19. | ||
The tiny Caribbean Coffee Republic of Guatemala or suffers its 60th | :18:19. | :18:29. | |
:18:29. | :18:34. | ||
political upheaval in 20 years... How to deliver fairness left. Left | :18:34. | :18:39. | |
pitted against Wright was at the heart of Cold War politics. It left | :18:39. | :18:46. | |
Guatemala and the whole region in conflict. -- left pitted against | :18:46. | :18:56. | |
:18:56. | :18:56. | ||
The fighting itself has now ended, although that took time. But the | :18:56. | :19:06. | |
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issue of equality remains BP in the sugar belt that produces | :19:22. | :19:27. | |
so much wealth, about half an hour's drive from where we found | :19:27. | :19:35. | |
Michael, is the small town of San Jose Di Idolo. -- deep in. A local | :19:35. | :19:39. | |
businessman ran to become mayor because he said people have been | :19:39. | :19:49. | |
:19:49. | :20:07. | ||
This is Alfredo lamb's regular meeting with mothers and children. | :20:07. | :20:17. | |
:20:17. | :20:17. | ||
Apology for the loss of subtitles for 40 seconds | :20:17. | :21:08. | |
Many of the men are in prison or Then down the Alice of shack homes, | :21:08. | :21:14. | |
almost half the children don't get enough food. -- alleys. Guatemala | :21:15. | :21:18. | |
has one of the highest malnutrition rates in the world and is one of | :21:18. | :21:28. | |
:21:28. | :22:00. | ||
Bad government, a lack of food and money. Yet the sugar industry now | :22:00. | :22:04. | |
says it has a blueprint for the country's development. What's | :22:04. | :22:10. | |
happening here is not government legislation and enforcement. Nor is | :22:10. | :22:15. | |
it an influx of international aid. The sugar industry itself has made | :22:15. | :22:20. | |
a decision that it's got to stop treating its workers badly, and | :22:20. | :22:30. | |
:22:30. | :22:32. | ||
make fundamental changes to gain greater access to global markets. | :22:32. | :22:37. | |
Trade and this new agreement is seen as the way forward. Europe, | :22:37. | :22:42. | |
although so far away, was once torn apart by war, dictatorship and | :22:42. | :22:47. | |
depression just like Guatemala. And it's now been adopted as a guiding | :22:47. | :22:53. | |
beacon. As we fly back from the Pantaleon Sugar Mill, Jose | :22:53. | :23:03. | |
:23:03. | :23:31. | ||
underlines his enthusiasm for the Essentially it's about how the most | :23:31. | :23:35. | |
vulnerable, like Michael, are treated by the secure and powerful. | :23:35. | :23:40. | |
And whether a document negotiated by those unfamiliar with the soot | :23:40. | :23:47. | |
and the grit of the cane fields will have any impact at all. It's a | :23:47. | :23:51. | |
good thing because a succession agreement will give a stronger | :23:51. | :23:55. | |
mandate to the EU to monitor, and a stronger framework for the | :23:55. | :23:59. | |
government to be able to pull together all the actors together | :24:00. | :24:04. | |
and the government itself to do an internal job of monitoring human | :24:04. | :24:11. | |
rights. We are very committed to better and better conditions each | :24:11. | :24:18. | |
day on Human Rights. But it's a trade agreement. It's almost a | :24:18. | :24:23. | |
condition that if you violate any of those, the trade agreement is | :24:23. | :24:28. | |
going to stop. We don't see it as a condition. We see it as going | :24:28. | :24:38. | |
:24:38. | :24:46. | ||
We know that what's happening here is not right. At dusk they elope | :24:46. | :24:52. |