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The Power of Fairtrade

Case Study
The story of Isaac Abincha

Isaac was born one of five brothers, not the eldest and not the youngest. As with many children born in the 1970’s in Kenya, his father had to choose which child he could afford to send to school and which he couldn’t. It was Isaac’s lot that he had to miss out.

Isaac however had a gift. As a child he played football with an old goatskin bag stuffed with paper, kicking it around the dusty backstreets of the ghetto he was born in, on the outskirts of Nairobi. He began to play for his local under 7’s team on a sloping barren area which would be hard enough just to walk up never mind play football on, and was noticed by the headmaster of a visiting school. Isaac stood out, as he was a tall and proud boy even at that age. For reasons best known to the headmaster, Mr Mwangi, offered Isaac a place at his school and Isaac excitedly ran home after the match to tell his father and mother.

Dad said no. He felt that there would have to be a catch and that some costs would need to be paid and he just could not afford it. Isaac was crestfallen.

After about a month, Mr Mwangi had heard nothing from either Isaac or his family so he took it upon himself to track the Abincha ghetto home down. After introducing himself to Isaac’s father he went on to explain that he would give Isaac a scholarship and there would be no fees to pay. Isaac could come and live at the school, do some cleaning work to pay for his keep and learn and play football. Isaac knelt in front of his father and pleaded to be allowed to go. It was then agreed that the 6 or 7 year old Isaac would go to the school, some 70kms away, and goodbye’s were said.

Now, dear reader, what a cute little story, where is it going to lead, ….small ghetto boy makes good and learns to read, write and becomes a credit to his community? Or becomes a doctor or a community worker wanting to put something back? Hell no. Isaac had just had his 8th birthday when he was raped by Mr Mwangi.

He was forced to live in a store cupboard next to the open pit toilet used by the school kids, of both sexes. He could come out during the day but not for lessons, he had to sweep and clean and was the butt of the school kids harsh and biting jibes and in the evenings he was visited by Mr Mwangi and …. Well, trust me when Isaac told me his story I had to stop him many times for I could not hold back my tears.

Aged 10 or thereabouts, Isaac tried to take his own life by hanging himself in the toilet, he failed and fell into the pit as the string he had salvaged for the job broke. Climbing from the pit, stinking and covered in all sorts of unimaginable excrement, he ran away. Over the next three weeks or so, he can’t remember specifically how long it took, he made his way back to Nairobi, stealing or begging food each day and walking, shoeless the 70 kilometres, eventually getting back to civilisation.

Did he go home and tell his parents about the ordeals he had suffered over the last three years? No, he thinks he was too embarrassed or ashamed to tell his parents, he felt he had let them down.

He lived rough on the streets of Nairobi, begging or stealing what he could to survive and about the age of 13 he began sniffing glue. The raggedly dressed boy had lost all his proud stance and was just skin and bone, but oh! so streetwise. Crime naturally followed and not suprisingly, aged 16, a 6 month jail sentence for street robbery. Jail in Nairobi is no pleasure trip, its not even civilised, cells have earth floors, no beds, no blankets, 5 or 6 to a cell. If you need the toilet during your 23 hour a day lock up you just go where you are and in what you are wearing. Lice and fleas your constant companions and physical abuse from fellow inmates or the guards commonplace. You either get tough or you die.
Isaac got tough.

On his release he had nowhere else to go, he didn’t want to return to the streets as he knew that would only lead to more glue sniffing and more crime. So, he went home. For the first time in 8 or 9 years he met with his family again. It was a breath of fresh air.

Isaac got himself a job, working for 200 bob (kenya shillings and about £1.50) a week in the forest just labouring. He gave his mum 150 bob a week for his food and keep. He started to get much stronger again and began to regain his muscular frame. His proudness returning.

One day Isaac was talking to a neighbour. This man told Isaac, just in conversation, that there was a job coming up for a man to look after some new trees that were being planted not too far away. Isaac enquired more and it turned out that the tree planting scheme was for a joint partnership between a UK firm who imported handicrafts and a local co-operative group which made the handicrafts.

Isaac knew about trees and so he applied to the secretary of the co-operative for the job. At the interview he heard all about the fairtrade initiative that three trees were to be planted for every one cut down. He liked the idea that more trees were being planted than were being used. Although completely uneducated, by our understanding of the word, he knew that was good for the planet and good for the country. He did not really understand the concept of fairtrade.

Towards the end of the interview, which had gone fairly well Isaac sheepishly asked about the pay. The secretary smiled and told him 1000 bob a week. Isaac shook his head and asked again, surely that could not be right, he must mean 1000 bob a month. The secretary repeated that it was 1000 bob a week, citing “Its fairtrade, you get a fair weeks pay for a fair weeks work”.

Isaac got the job and worked diligently planting, cropping, coppicing and protecting his stands of softwoods. About 18 months ago Isaac was at work when towards dusk he saw three men walking through the bottom of the woods. Each were carrying a panga (long chopping knife), they could only have one purpose, that of illegal logging.

Without thought for his own safety Isaac followed the men till they stopped some way off and began to examine a particular tree. They started to hack away at it when Isaac approached. Isaac startled the men who turned to face him, panga’s in their hands. Isaac calmly told them that they must leave. They laughed at him and said he should leave as they were three and he was one. Isaac said he wasn’t alone and drew his panga from his belt scabbard. A short standoff followed and Isaac asked them, “These trees are fairtrade, are they worth your life, because I assure you most certainly, they are worth mine”.

The poachers must have been convinced by the sincerity of the words, or maybe the inflection in the voice or maybe, as I would have been, by this muscular man wielding a three foot long hacking sword and assuring me he would risk his life for a tree, they ran off.

He has even got himself married and started his own family, he has even taken football up again, but he never told anyone his story, till now.

I asked Isaac if he would really have fought those men and risked his life to protect a tree. He told me “Certainly, but it wasn’t just for the tree it is the principle”.
I asked him to explain what principle, he replied “My life hasn’t always been good and for a long time I believed it wasn’t worth living, but now God has seen fit to give me another road to go down, one that if I help it then it will help me”.
I said to him “I’m not sure I would have risked my life like that”
Isaac looked up, a knowing expression on his face, “You have had your life up till now and I have had mine. I know the true value of things including life and death, I have been there. I will protect those trees for fairtrade as it gives all of us life”.

I just couldn’t argue with that.

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