Growers and Gardeners, please be aware…

At this time of year, many of our Great British Retailers are offering us sets of very cheap garden tools, which have been made in the Far East. As a director of a small tool-making enterprise in Yorkshire, I know that the prices of these tools are scandalously low, and that there is a lot wrong about their procurement.

If I were a retailer (which I am not), I would be able to buy a carbon steel border spade for £2.95p. or less. It simply beggars belief to realize that the base-line importers of these tools have paid even less than that. Neither the people who made the tools, or the raw materials and energy used to forge them, will have received a fraction of what is their due. When we purchase these products, which are available everywhere, we are implicitly approving exploitation of the worst kind. How come?

The people who make these tools often exist in communities that are both owned and controlled by their factories. They are rewarded with food, lodging, and often no pay at all (e.g. parts of India). They have to compete to work alongside queues of 'substitute workers', waiting to replace them if they fall ill or get hurt as they work. In China, some workers are known to live in basement dormitories underneath the factory floors, and to be away from their families for years at a time. Hidden costs and immense suffering accompany the making of cheap hand-tools, and it is time we faced up to these truths by demanding Fair Trade. It is in all our interests to do so.*

Hand tools were once loved and revered, and in a very small way, our own tool company is attempting to revive that tradition. A friend tells me that in parts of Bali (Indonesia), it is still considered wrong to step over hand-tools that are lying on the ground. Our gardeners might reflect upon this gentleness, this respect, before purchasing their 'value for money' forks and spades which have just been hammered out of poverty, destitution and corruption.

Yours sincerely,

Philip Trevelyan (Farmer & Director of L-D Tools).

*We are hoping to open a charitable account for receiving contributions to such a cause. It is our intention to release at least one new product based on an adaptation of an imported border spade, from which all sales-profits will go to a charitable account. One of these will be a 'complete mole-trappers kit'.

Company reg.no.: 3513183. Vat no: 708 7025 39GB. Authentication code: 273172