Ursula Brunner

Activism and the Bananenfrauen movement

In the early 1970s, Brunner became increasingly involved with the problems in banana trade. The movie Bananera Libertad by Peter von Gunten, which she saw in a screening she organized for her women's group, is often cited as an early event which sensitized her to the conditions under which imported bananas were produced.^[1][3]

In 1973, the Swiss retailer Migros announced a "banana miracle", a reduction in the price of bananas by 15 centimes, from CHF 1.5 per kilogram to CHF 1.35 in response to the dollar devaluation. This was met with objection from Brunner and her peers.^[3][4] The collective's proposal to Migros to keep the price at CHF 1.5 and use the 15 extra centimes to improve the working conditions of the banana farmers was rejected; Migros responded by saying "We are no charity".^[3] In October of the same year, Brunner and her group organized their first campaign to educate people on the pricing practices in the banana industry. The women carted about half a ton of bananas through Frauenfeld to give them away together with an educative gazette and collected signatures.^[1][3] This campaign was covered on national TV and the women's collective under Brunner became known as the Bananenfrauen ("Banana women").^[1][4]

By 1974, Brunner and the Bananenfrauen had influenced about 100 Swiss retailers to apply a surcharge of 15 centimes per kilogram of Chiquita and Dole bananas, the amount of the 1973 price reduction of Migros.^[5] The profits from this surcharge were redistributed to Swiss social aid organizations and used to finance projects in Guatemala, Honduras, and Colombia.^[5] This campaign was only a first step for the women, as they seeked to import their own bananas to Switzerland. To this end, Brunner traveled to Latin America to make contacts with exporters; her first visit was in 1976 to Guatemala.^[3]

It was not until a decade later when they could realize this goal. After the US declared an embargo against Nicaragua in 1985, Nicaraguan banana exporters were forced to pivot to Europe. The Bananenfrauen began importing Nicaraguan bananas to Switzerland in 1986.^[3] The Bananenfrauen described these bananas, later dubbed Nica-Bananen, as the "first fairly produced bananas" and sold them with the same 15 centime surcharge, which was similarly used to finance social aid programs in Latin America.^[1][3] In need of structured organization, the Bananenfrauen founded the gebana association in 1988.^[6] The sale of these Bananas was discontinued in 1997, when Max Havelaar launched their Fairtrade certified bananas, as gebana did not want to create competition on the market.^[3] Gebana was formalized into the joint-stock company gebana AG in 1998 and focused on other products.^[7]

For her work, Brunner is frequently described as a pioneer of fair trade in Switzerland.^[1][3][5]

Political career with the FDP

After the introduction of the women's right to vote in Thurgau in 1971, the FDP district party asked her to run for the Grossrat (legislative council) of Thurgau.^[8] She was elected in the by-elections of 1975 to replace Max Steiner (FDP) for a term length of around half a year, as the first woman for the FDP and the third woman in total in the Grossrat.^[9][10] In 1980, she again succeeded into the Grossrat to replace Max Rutishauser (FDP).^[11]

Tensions between Brunner and the FDP arose in August 1982, when she organized a demonstration for peace at the Wehrschau, a Swiss army show.^[1][8] A series of provocative articles in the Schweizerzeit  [de] sparked debates in Swiss media and prompted a confrontation of Brunner by the FDP, in which she described her commitment to her non-parliamentary activities.^[8] A party assembly in October voted to withdraw the party's trust in Brunner, meaning that she was not allowed to run for a seat in the Grossrat after her term ended in 1984.^[8]