Declaring that, as a white Jamaican, he had been involved in "a great theft—people who had not been paid properly for their part in the nation's development", Roddy Edwards and his wife Ann spoke about the Walkerswood Experience at a Greencoat Forum in London, 8th April.

Declaring that, as a white Jamaican, he had been involved in "a great theft—people who had not been paid properly for their part in the nation's development", Roddy Edwards and his wife Ann spoke about the Walkerswood Experience at a Greencoat Forum in London, 8th April. Walkerswood is the Jamaican community where Edwards was one of the founding partners of Walkerswood Foods Ltd, which exports 17 products around the world.

"We had robbed people consistently," said Edwards, referring to the white community's exploitation of the majority of Jamaica's population during the colonial era. Compensating with cheques is easy, he said. “But that is not the answer. What is needed to right this historic wrong is decently paid jobs over the long term. I felt I should work towards this in repentance for all the benefits, like my expensive education, which the past exploitation had enabled."

It was this motivation which led Edwards to work with others from the community in founding the Walkerswood Food company as a partnership venture, 25 years ago. The aim was to give employment to the village and community where his family had lived for five generations. "What the world needed was a different form of economic organisation—where wealth didn't go to a few but was shared transparently," Edwards said. The company, located close to where Bob Marley lived, now employs 100 people with a turnover last year of US$3.5 million. It is run by a group of 12 partners and there is an employee share ownership scheme. It sells 17 products to major supermarket chains in the USA, the UK and elsewhere. In London it also runs the Bamboula Jamaican restaurant in Brixton.

"The impact on the village has been huge," said Edwards. A local farmer employs 40 people to grow peppers for making Walkerswood Food's celebrated jerk seasoning and pepper sauces. "And farming peppers means you don't need to farm drugs," said Edwards.

"Walkerswood has achieved miracles," said Lawrence Fearon, the Afro-Caribbean chairman of the forum, introducing the Edwards. "This is a story of faith, and social and economic justice." It was an example of sustainable development based on the development of people in the community. He quoted from the company's literature, which says that "the vision of Walkerswood is to tackle social and economic problems at source".

The vision had grown after Edwards' elder brother, Jonathan, had been impacted by a conference for "the moral and spiritual rearmament of the world" in 1965. The emphasis was that "change starts with me". "I couldn't get out of my mind that I had to change," said Roddy Edwards. He joined the Unemployment Committee of the Community Council. The Council built a community centre and one project to emerge from the unemployment committee was to sell jerk (seasoned) pork to the eight bars in the surrounding area. "The conviction grew to find a decently paid job for everyone in the village."

Edwards said that he had learnt three lessons over the years:

Firstly, "faith in the Almighty's provision". When the company faced bankruptcy in 1997, Chinese Jamaican investor Ray Chang visited Walkerswood and, and as part of his commitment to Jamaican agricultural development, he “invested serious money in Walkerswood”. Edwards commented that, time and time again, resources had unexpectedly emerged to keep the company developing.

Secondly, "to go for it". This meant "to really search for and share our deepest dreams and not to compromise. To go through the doors that are always open." Walkerswood Foods had grown out of the shared dreams and motivations of all the partners—men and women, black and white, young and old. They include the wheelchair-bound managing director, Woody Mitchell, and the managing director of marketing, Virginia Burke. The aim of Walkerswood now was to "build a Caribbean world brand name".

Thirdly, teamwork. "We have to stick together if we are to carry out our dreams," Edwards said. For him it was "an absolute blessing to have a partner with whom one can be totally honest". Edwards' wife Ann told how the community had campaigned to clean up a local waste dump used by cruise ships coming into Montego Bay. Following a road-block protest, the dump is no longer a health hazard. Edwards emphasised that their task "hasn't always been sugar and light". There were battles against corruption. And banks were far too unwilling to take risks in investing in local businesses. Edwards emphasised that when people are paid a decent wage they find this an incentive for better education to acquire new and better-paid skills.

In the Walkerswood community of some 2,500 people, "we are getting to a situation where everyone who wants to work can find a job,” he concluded.

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© Caux Initiatives for Business, 2003