Hello and welcome to Business Daily from the BBC World Service. I'm Gideon Long and today I'm reporting from

Colombia, the most dangerous country in the world, in which to be a trade unionist. According to figures from the Labour Ministry,

well over 3,000 trade unionists have been murdered here since the early 1970s. These are targeted murders.

They know what they are doing. They know who they want to murder.

We are always the first ones to be attacked. In this program, I speak to Colombian workers who've been

shot at, threatened with violence, and who've seen their work colleagues killed.

Ten people have been murdered just from our branch of the Union.

In this country, social leaders and trade union leaders are killed every day.

And you'll hear a call for multinational companies to act.

Global companies and foreign investors that are present in Colombia must step up.

That's the dangers of being a trade unionist in Colombia coming up on today's Business

Daily from the BBC World Service.

Welcome to the southwest of Colombia and to the Kalka Valley.

The Kauka is one of the two great rivers that cuts through this country,

the other being the Magdalena. And the Calca Valley is home to Columbia's sugar industry.

And we're driving through the sugar cane fields now. Everywhere you look, there are these

tall, vibrant green shoots in Neat Row is covering field after field.

And along the roads there are articulated trucks pulling long caravans of wagons stacked high with sugarcate.

And I'm on my way to Cali, the regional capital

and Colombia's third largest city

to meet some of the people who work in this industry.

In a hotel in Cali, I meet three of these workers,

...