Strike Revives Automation Call in World's Top Tea Exporter
- Industry lost over 400 million shillings in three-week strike
- Kenyan court asked 16,000 workers to resume work on Wednesday
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A strike by Kenyan tea pickers has rekindled large-scale tea growers’ plans to replace humans with plucking machines, threatening jobs in an economy that’s struggling to create employment, according to the main producers association.
Companies including Unilever Tea Kenya Ltd. -- which produces the Lipton brand -- Williamson Tea Kenya Ltd. and James Finlay Kenya Ltd. lost more than 400 million shillings ($3.9 million) of output in a three-week strike that ended Tuesday, Kenya Tea Growers Association Chief Executive Officer Apollo Kiarie said. About 16,000 tea pickers and other workers at estates that produce 40 percent of the nation’s output demanded a cumulative 75 percent wage increase.