The piece by your reporter on the sad plight of plantation workers ('Descendants of indentured labourers see little change', Nov 22) illustrates among other things that the conditions of plantation workers have not changed in any substantial manner. This is very illustrative of the nature of plantations, the organisation of capital, the premium placed on wage increase and the ultimate necessity to subdue labour through the employment coercion and extreme forms of paternalism.

Although plantations are basically dying very slowly due to a variety of factors associated with the development of modern sectors of economy, sizeable portions of acreage in the country are still being used for agricultural export crops.

If at all there has been any improvement of labour, it has merely come by way of resistance and global political, social and economic changes. Since the particular variant of capitalism in Malaysia is a peculiar one, modern sectors can co-exist with primitive accumulation, although the latter faces the prospect of decline in long run.

While the decline of the plantation economy cannot be arrested, still much can be done for labour. A combination of forces, state, unions, NGOs and others can provide some basic benefits for workers who have been long cheated from the development derive.

However, in the Malaysian case, employer opposition and state connivance offer little prospect for workers' advance. Without the benefit of a strong union, it looks like workers have to depend upon themselves to spearhead improvements although time is not on their side.