Firestone’s Liberian plantation ‘dead within ten years’

A legal spokesman for Firestone has said the world’s largest rubber plantation might be dead within ten years unless an urgent re-planting programme begins. Talks on such a programme have been slow, according to Gerald Padmore, outside counsel for Firestone, quoted in a Financial Times story.

Michael Peel, an FT reporter visited the plantation and spoke to the Firestone legal representative and the plantation manager. He writes that the country has suffered from 15 years of civil war and there has been no significant re-planting…