Reflections of a farmer's daughter

by Caitlin Bearden

They say growing up on a farm is one of the best ways to spend your childhood. My summer days were spent running through corn fields, riding tractors, and setting up a lemonade stand in the middle of nowhere. (Consequently my dad was my number one customer.)

My life was a journey through muddy creeks with ripped jeans and my little brother as co-pilot. I loved every minute. When I was that age I never really understood just how much hard work went into farming. I saw our land as my playground. Not until later in life did I realize that for my dad, it’s been a lifetime of hard work, with sweat-filled soil and very little pay.  No matter how hard it has been or how hard it will be, he still plows those fields I grew up running through.

I’ve learned a lot as a farmer’s daughter, such as a deeply-rooted respect for people who work with their hands and provide for others. But until recently, I knew very little about the thousands of migrant farmworkers who travel far, often leaving their families behind. Or, about farmworkers who suffer from respiratory problems due to pesticide exposure, or the ten-year-olds who work 15 hours a day picking blueberries.  

Even growing up with a farming background, I found myself simplifying just how much work goes into agriculture, as I think many of us do. We visit our local grocery store, place food in our basket, pay the cashier, and that is the extent of our relationship with farmworkers. We never think twice about the hands that placed our strawberries in their nicely packaged containers or the person who fed the cows that produced our milk by the gallons. It seems so easy to forget about the work it took to get it all there. 

Organizations like the Farmworker Advocacy Network work hard to bring attention to the real living and working conditions of farmworkers and how we can make a difference. There is pride, beauty and fun in farming, but more often than not, there are harsh realities. Not all farms are like my dad’s. For a lot of kids, the farm is not their playground. 

Farmworkers Come to Capitol Hill Seeking Safeguards

by Anna Jensen

“The laws of our country afford far less workplace protection to farmworkers than most workers receive in other industrial sectors.  Despite the clear hazards of their work, farmworkers are not even guaranteed basic on-the-job protections to reduce exposure to the highly toxic pesticides that threaten their well-being and that of their families and children. The threat facing millions of farmworkers that work in our nation’s fields, farms and nurseries is not only toxic but fundamentally unjust and the EPA has a legal duty to correct this.” –Tripp Van Noppen, president of Earthjustice

Washington, D.C. – On July 15 and July 16 on Capitol Hill, a dozen farmworkers from across the nation met with their members of Congress to call for the implementation of stronger protections for farmworkers from hazardous pesticides. An estimated 5.1 billion pounds of pesticides are applied to crops annually in the United States, and farmworkers face the greatest threat from these chemicals of any sector of society, with thousands of farmworkers each year experiencing pesticide poisoning.

“How can people eat knowing that so much pain and suffering went into this fruit or this bottle of wine?” asked Alina Diaz, vice president of Alianza Nacional de Campesinas. “That is not fair. Lawmakers need to really make a strong effort to make better legislation so these workers are protected.”

The farmworkers and allies visiting D.C. this week are calling on Congress to protect the health of farmworkers and their families by strengthening the Worker Protection Standard regulations. These rules were established by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to set agricultural worker safety standards for pesticide use, but have not been updated or revised for more than 20 years, despite overwhelming evidence of their inadequacy.

The nation’s 1-2 million farmworkers form the backbone of the U.S. agricultural economy and many are regularly exposed to pesticides.  The federal government estimates that there are 10-20,000 acute pesticide poisonings among workers in the agricultural industry annually, a figure that likely understates the actual number of acute poisonings since many affected farmworkers may not seek care from a physician.

Farmworker families are also exposed to pesticides in the form of residues on workers’ tools, clothes, shoes, and skin. The close proximity of agricultural fields to residential areas also results in aerial drift of pesticides into farmworkers’ homes, schools, and playgrounds. Research shows that children are especially vulnerable to harms from these exposures, even at very low levels.

Short-term effects of pesticide exposures can include stinging eyes, rashes, blisters, nausea, headaches, respiratory problems and even death. Cumulative long-term exposures can increase the risk for farmworkers and their children of serious chronic health problems such as cancer, birth defects, neurological impairments and Parkinson’s disease.

Most workers in the U.S. look to the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) for standards to protect them from exposure to hazardous chemicals. Protection for farmworkers from pesticides is left to the EPA’s authority under the Worker Protection Standard of the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide and Rodenticide Act (“FIFRA”), a standard that is far more lenient than OSHA rules and is fundamentally inadequate.

The farmworkers and advocates are calling for these changes to the Worker Protection Standard:

•           Provide more frequent and more comprehensible pesticide safety training for farmworkers

•           Include information about farmworker families’ exposures to pesticides in the required training materials

•           Ensure that workers receive information about specific pesticides used in their work

•           Require safety precautions and protective equipment limiting farmworkers’ contact with pesticides

•           Require medical monitoring of workers who handle neurotoxic pesticides

Want to help put pressure on the EPA to update the rules? Sign a petition urging the EPA to better protect workers. 

SAF interns and fellows are blogging as they go

By Michael Durbin

This year, interns on assignment with Student Action with Farmworkers have a new documentary tool at their disposal: the blog.

Hosted on Tumblr and named for SAF’s flagship summer intern program, Into the Fields allows the 25 students to capture their experiences providing health, legal, education, and organizing outreach with farmworkers in the southeast over the course of the 10-week program. Posts are also provided by the 5 students participating in the Sowing Seeds for Change fellowship program, which runs for six months.

Here are a few samples:

…his wife brought the little girl in from the bus. Jolly immediately lit up at the sight of her father sitting there in the kitchen, stretched out her arms and yelled “Papi!" Having a close relationship with my own father, this especially touched me. Some day Jolly will recognize all the sacrifices Juan made to give her a wonderful life in the United States and I can only imagine how grateful she will be.

- Jasmine Romero and Jocelyn Moratzka, 2013 SAF Interns

Certainly one of the most fun parts of the summer thus far has been participating in the SAF theater group. I was nervous when I first found out I’d be acting… The play, written by SAF’s very own Raúl Gámez, is called “Una chela al año no hace daño.” … I play an outreach worker from a health clinic who visits a camp to talk about alcoholism and alternative lifestyle practices that are better for one’s well-being, like yoga, dancing, drawing, writing, playing music, playing soccer, etc.

- Christine Burke, 2013 SAF Intern

Outreach consists of health evaluations, which includes taking height, weight, blood pressure, and asking to see if the individual has any unmet health needs. When we go out, though, we spend a lot of time at the camp talking and getting to know the workers… Last night, after we finished the health evaluations, I played on a swing set with some children and told ghost stories: it was great. 

- Mimi Reiser, 2013 SAF Intern

Throughout the summer, students will share stories of outreach, of their new communities, and of their hopes for change. They may choose to post in either English or Spanish.

The Into the Fields blog is located at http://saf-unite.tumblr.com/. Durham-based Student Action with Farmworkers is a member of the Farmworker Advocacy Network.