Humana People-to-People Alert

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Please help us keep this page up to date. Email new information to: contact@humana-alert.com

 Other countries 

Furtherland Farming Ltd

Banana Tropic SA de C.V.

Pacific Produce Ltd

La Vigia SA, El Rosario, La Vigia, El Rosario, El Chispero, Las Canitas, El Varadero del Orinoco

Southern Africa

Land in countries including Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Zambia. For example: the Mozambique Agricultural Company Lda.

  The Henning Bjornlund story  

Now living in Australia, Danish-born Henning Bjornlund is generally credited with being the financial genius who controlled Teachers Group finances 1970-1989 and the architect of its multi-million dollar landholdings investments in Central America.

In 1995, an undercover Danish journalist tracked Bjornlund and his wife down down to their home in Adelaide, where he reportedly confessed that Tvind was 'all about profit'. He left Denmark mysteriously in 1989 (reportedly with a 'golden handshake' of $100,000) and resettled in Australia as a research fellow in international property markets at the University of South Australia. His curriculum vitae makes no mention of his years with Tvind.

Danish police say they would like to talk to Bjornlund next time he is in Denmark.

  Country by Country  

Read our dossier on
Floryl >>>>

  Brazil: Floryl 

Timber, fruit, rice and soya

Size: 92,000 hectares
Bought: 1994
Cost: $12 million

Full details

Massive ranch at the heart of the 200-2006 Teachers Group fraud case, allegedly bought through front companies using money meant for humanitarian and environmental aid. Teachers Group claims it is 'a unique nature protection project'.

  Belize: mangos  

Tens of thousands of hectares of mango and banana plantations bought 1983-88, including the biggest mango plantation in America, Monkey River Estate. In the 1990s, the German author Frank Nordhausen visited the area and was seen off by armed guards. The man in charge is TG veteran Soren Hofdahl Sorenson ('the Farmer').

Cowpen Farm is a 150 hectare banana farm. A strike over pay and conditions by workers here in 2001 led to a banana boycott by European trade unions. In July 2005, Belize TV reported that the farms were up for sale as the Teachers Group had defaulted on a $2m public loan, and there were also reports the companies had been put into receivership. But there are signs (in 2006) that the TG may be back and up to its former exploitative ways again.

Belize Gold Bananas, Tropical Produce Ltd, Toledo Citrus Co Ltd, Toledo Fish Farming Ltd, Farm 1 Ltd, Cowpen Farms Ltd, Farm 11 Ltd, Farm 12 Ltd, D&F Ltd, Riversdale Ltd, Seven Hills Estate Ltd, Monkey River Estate.

Dossier in preparation

  Ecuador: La Italia  

Bananas

Size: unknown
Bought: 1988
Cost: unknown

A large commercial banana plantation, Hacienda La Italia, owned by Tvind since 1988, with fruit sold through the giant US food company Dole.

Strikes here in 2001-2 in protest at poor conditions led to many workers being sacked without pay. In 2002-2, the Teachers Group sold two other farms in Ecuador.

 

Read our dossier on St Lucia >>>

  St Lucia: Mt Lezard  

Bananas

Size: 1,137 qcres
Bought: 1986
Cost: unknown

Also: Park Estate, River Doree Holdings.

Mt Lezard Estate was forcibly sold to the Teachers Group by the St Lucia government in 1986, in the face of opposition from the owners, the Lawaetz family.

Roy Lawaetz, the owner's son, believes his elderly father was bullied into the sale by the TG with the support of the St Lucia government. Roy's story

 

 The Tvind property portfolio  

Since the 1980s the Teachers Group has spent tens of millions of dollars buying extensive fruit farms in developing countries - notably Belize, Brazil, the Cayman Islands, Ecuador, El Salvador, Venezuela, St Lucia, and probably Fiji as well.

Most are owned and operated by the Tvind offshore company Fairbank, Cooper & Lyle (FC&L), which also owns the US used clothes company U'SAgain. The bananas at your local grocery might well have come from a Teachers Group plantation.

But where did the Teachers Group get the money for these massive land purchases? And what has it got to do with charity or development?

Danish police believe some of these huge landholdings were bought with money originally intended for humanitarian aid - in particular, the immense 92,000 hectare estate at Floryl in Brazil. . See also the 2001 Danish police report, and read the Henning Bjornlund story below.

The TG farms have nothing to do with humanitarian aid. In fact, they are described by as highly exploitative - vast work camps, where migrant farm workers are treated like slaves - poorly housed, badly paid, obliged to work with dangerous pesticides yet denied health and safety or trade union rights, and sometimes not paid at all for months. A far cry from enlightened 'humanitarianism' indeed.

The farms are an integral part of the Teachers Group network of offshore companies, tax dodges, bank accounts and 'insider deals'. The produce is thought to be sold to Europe and the United States through trading companies themselves owned and run by the Teachers Group.