Green Gold by Robert Thomson

Green Gold by Robert Thomson

Green Gold looks at the history and future prospects for the banana industry in four Caribbean islands: Dominica, Grenada, St Lucia and St Vincent. It focuses on conditions for the small farmers and includes a study of Geest PLC, the company solely responsible for distributing Windward bananas in Britain.

Statistical profile of the Eastern Caribbean, Introduction, Enslavement, From sugar to bananas, Bananas and communism, Towards independence, Winds of change, 'Persistent poverty', 1 The international banana market, The producers, The markets, The multinationals, The international banana, industry: future prospects, 2 Geest: Paternalism and profits, The early years: from bulbs to bananas, We have no bananas, Quotas, tariffs and a guaranteed market, Thirty years of expansion: minimising risks, maximising profits, The Growers' Associations, Land, Bad publicity, The final sell-off

A safe harbour, The Economic League, GeestPLC, Mutual dependency?, 3 Banana work: How the Caribbean farmer earns his 'ten per cent', A risky business, Fieldpacking, From port to shop, Who takes the risks?, 4 Case studies, St Lucia, Dominica, Grenada, Conclusion, Alternatives, Bibliography

Robert Thomson is a Toronto-based writer and editor. In 1993, he published his debut book, Secret Things. The next year, a redesigned edition was released. He began working as a journalist, editor, and managing editor at a number of local periodicals around this time. Robert's short stories appeared in anthologies such as Queer View Mirror, Brothers Of The Night: Gay Vampire Stories, Quickies 2, Best Gay Erotica 1998, Queer View Mirror 2, Happily Ever After: Sexual Fairy Tales for Men, and Quickies 3 from the mid-to-late 1990s.

Need, his second collection of short stories, was supposed to be released in January 2000, but the publisher's US distributor went bankrupt the same week the complete print run arrived at their warehouse. He left the publishing field long after due to a variety of other personal and professional disappointments. Robert began experimenting with video editing software while working as a DJ, VJ, and poet. For the next few years, he planned, wrote, filmed, directed, and edited a number of short films, including Text and Last Visit (Ultima visita), which was nominated for Best Short at the 2011 Barcelona GLBT Film Festival.

Both of Robert's books were re-released in extended e-book editions in 2014. Hidden Things was released in June, honoring the twentieth anniversary of its publication. Need was released in December, on the fifteenth anniversary of its release. Now..., a free taster of his work from HowNow Media, was released for a short time.

Where had I been? Robert's first collection of all-new short tales since 1999, Little Grievances, will be released in June 2016. Robert is a resident of Toronto, Ontario, Canada.