Tough Road Ahead for NC Poultry Workers

Photo by Flickr member: USDAgov

Guest post by John Zambenini, Duke Divinity School Intern

The Raleigh News & Observer reported recently that work may be getting harder for North Carolina’s poultry workers. If the Obama administration gives the go-ahead, new policies already backed by North Carolina Senator Kay Hagan will allow the difficult speeds at which workers must process chickens to increase. Under the new regulations, the total output of inspected birds would increase from 140 birds per minute to 175.

Facing a dizzying onslaught of chickens and turkeys on fast-moving mechanical equipment, workers risk injuring hands, wrists, and shoulders from the quick, repetitive motions needed to process the birds. A mistake with a knife at such a rate can be costly, and the work often comes with low pay and little protection. Many injuries go unreported, according to the News & Observer story, because workers are afraid of being fired and have few other options for work in the United States.

At a recent Day of the Dead memorial service hosted by the Farmworker Advocacy Network – a statewide coalition which includes the NC Council of Churches – workers told reporters that as they gain experience, the number of birds they must process increases. Pay raises, however, were so meager that with the increased number of birds to process, their wages were effectively cut. With the anticipated changes, the output of poultry processing facilities is expected to increase even more, with little promise of benefit.

On the same day, officials released stats on annual workplace deaths in the state. Despite a decrease from last year, Labor Commissioner Cherie Berry conceded the state must do better, the News & Observer reported. Preventing a death here, or protecting a worker against pesticide exposure or injury there, is a worthwhile endeavor. While increased workplace safety is commendable, incremental reductions of injuries and deaths represents a misguided view of what it means to live and work in North Carolina.

This kind of effort alone creates a culture of acceptable margins of error for injury and death when year-end statistics are released, rather than endeavoring to create a humane, safe and just climate for labor in North Carolina in the first place. It has nothing to say of creating a clean, hospitable environment when migrant workers, upon which the industry is dependent, are employed. This kind of labor culture also has nothing to say for the powerless when increased production is demanded with no promise of the support needed to sustain them.

Meanwhile, industry trade journal Ag Professional is reporting that 2013 meant huge growth in North Carolina’s $70 billion agriculture industry, with continued expansion expected in 2014. The policy changes backed by Sen. Hagan and the poultry industry no doubt promise growth for North Carolina’s $13 billion poultry industry, as well. Progress is evidently being made, growth is happening. But what are we becoming if we grow with little concern for those upon whom we are dependent?

The post Tough Road Ahead for NC Poultry Workers appeared first on NC Council of Churches.

The Journey of Your Christmas Tree

The Ag Act: Congress Considers Turning Back the Clock to the Bracero Program

A bracero worker in the 1950's. Photo by APT.Somewhat lost this summer amidst all the conversation about comprehensive immigration reform is a little-known bill called the "Agricultural Guestworker Act" (or "Ag Act," HB 1773) that has already passed out of the House Judiciary Committee. This harmful bill is a thinly veiled attempt to strip farmworkers of the few rights they have on the job while propping up agribusinesses' bottom line.  

A farmworker in Eastern NC (2009). Photo by Peter Eversoll.

Here's how it works: the Ag Act would establish a new agricultural guestworker program allowing US companies to hire foreign-born workers for temporary employment in that industry. Under the current system employer certification is required, which builds in some worker protections. However, under the Ag Act, employers would only need to attest—on their on behalf, with no outside verification—that they have adequate workplace conditions, recruitment practices, wages, and insurance coverage for worker injuries. Workers would be allowed to move between employers without losing their visa. Also, 10% of a worker’s earnings would be withheld from their paycheck. The worker could only get this money from a U.S. embassy/consulate within 30 days of returning to their home country, and the worker must show they’ve followed program requirements. Furthermore, guestworkers under this bill would not be allowed to bring spouses or minor children under their visa. Finally, federal public benefits would not be available to guestworkers under the Ag Act.

We wanted workers but we got people. ~Max Frisch

Some of the Ag Act provisions are very similar to those in the infamous Bracero Program which exploited and abused 3 million temporary agricultural workers from the 1940s to the 1960s. If passed, the Ag Act would harm all workers by driving down wages, creating a second class of workers vulnerable to employer abuse, and providing reduced oversight of workers’ rights. Eligible workers would be denied access to cost-saving benefits under the Affordable Care Act as well as social welfare programs designed for those most in need. Most troubling is that guestworkers would not be allowed to become permanent legal U.S. residents, creating a class of workers exploited solely for their labor, held forever apart from being included as an equal in the country their labors serve.

-Download the fact sheet by American Friends Service Committee

Instead of adopting the more reasonable Senate bill framework that includes the "Ag-Jobs" compromise (an agreement between agribusiness and farmworkers that would allow farmworkers to get on an accelerated path to citizenship), the Ag Act will harm one of the most vulnerable working populations in the U.S. Apparently, we want the cheap labor that farmworkers provide without acknowledging the whole person - family unity, protections on the job, a safety net for hard times. Farmworkers do backbreaking work, often in deplorable conditions, and they deserve to be treated with dignity. Congress shouldn't turn the clock back on them now.

One Heat-Related Death Is Too Many

By Michael Durbin

Earlier this month, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention released a report confirming that heat-related deaths are on the rise. Now that summer has begun it’s a good time to recognize the workers most affected by this lethal trend: farmworkers. According to the CDC, agricultural workers die from heat stroke at a rate not double or triple or even quadruple the rate of other workers, but 20 times greater than the general US workforce.

The reasons go beyond the obvious fact that farmworkers are in an open field, under the sun, most of the day. In addition to environmental heat, the human body also generates heat internally with every exercise of a muscle. And when farmworkers are paid by how much they harvest, rather than by the hour, they are financially pressured to maximize physical exertion in order to fill more buckets of sweet potatoes or blueberries or whatever. The harder they work the more they earn. Limited access to shade, or the need to walk long distances to get to it, only heightens this effect.

The human body has mechanisms for shedding excessive heat. But even these can give out under the extreme conditions of farmworking. We produce sweat in order for it to evaporate, thus transferring heat from skin to air. But the sweat can’t evaporate when the farmworker is clad head-to-toe in the heavy, long-sleeved clothing needed to keep toxic pesticides from entering that same skin. Even when we can sweat freely, that sweat takes precious salt from our bodies, causing water to rush into muscles, leading to painful cramps or spasms. Worse, redirection of blood to the skin reduces blood flow—and hence oxygen—to the brain. This leads to symptoms such lightheadedness, dizziness, irritability and impaired judgment.

Once our body temperature exceeds 104 degrees, our heat regulators all but give up. The sweating stops. And this is like a nuclear reactor losing its coolant. The core can no longer function properly and organs such as the heart, liver and kidneys can start to fail. So too the brain and the central nervous system. Left in this state, it’s only a matter of time before the convulsions and seizures set in, then coma and brain damage, and ultimately death.

Nobody knows how many farmworkers have suffered this fate. The CDC reports that more than 7,200 people died from excess heat from 1999 to 2009, but those numbers didn’t account for migrant workers. They, along with other non-residents, were only included in these tallies starting only last year. And the ill effects of heat don’t end with the work day. A recent study in the American Journal of Public Health shows that farmworkers continue to experience excessive heat even after leaving the fields.

Even one heat-related death is too many because we know how to prevent them. The CDC, in collaboration with the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, last month published an employers guide for preventing heat-related illness or death. The measures are sensible and simple and include these:

• Establishing work/rest schedules appropriate for current conditions.
• Ensuring access to shade or cool areas.
• Monitoring workers during hot conditions.
• Providing prompt medical attention when workers show signs of heat-related illness.
• Drinking water or other liquids frequently enough to never become thirsty, about 1 cup every 15– 20 minutes.
• Eating during lunch and other rest breaks to replace lost electrolytes.
• Wearing light-colored, loose-fitting, breathable clothing such as cotton, and a wide-brimmed hat when possible.
• Recognizing that protective clothing or personal protective equipment may increase the risk of heat stress

The extraordinary risk of heat-related death is but one of many reasons agricultural work is among the most deadly occupations in America. And with extreme heat events on the rise, the need to address this risk is more urgent than ever.

REFERENCES

Get used to killer heat waves, CDC warns 
http://vitals.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/06/06/18803031-get-used-to-killer-heat-waves-cdc-warns?lite

CDC urges everyone: Get ready to stay cool before temperatures soar
http://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2013/p0606-extreme-heat.html

Preventing Heat-related Illness or Death of Outdoor Workers
http://www.cdc.gov/niosh/docs/wp-solutions/2013-143/

Heat-Related Deaths Among Crop Workers --- United States, 1992--2006
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/mm5724a1.htm

Farmworkers continue to experience excessive heat even after leaving the fields, shows research
http://www.news-medical.net/news/20130614/Farmworkers-continue-to-experience-excessive-heat-even-after-leaving-the-fields-shows-research.aspx

Our moral imperative: Protecting all children in NC

By Melinda Wiggins | Originally published by the Raleigh News & Observer

Last month, N.C. Senate Rules Chairman Tom Apodaca refused to allow so much as a hearing of Senate Bill 707, all but killing it. What did the Henderson Republican find so objectionable?

The bill would ban the employment of children under age 14 in one of the deadliest occupations in America. But isn’t that already illegal? Didn’t child labor laws from the 1930s put an end to the industrial exploitation of kids? Not in agriculture. Not in North Carolina. Here, impoverished kids as young as 10 can be hired to work for strangers in sun-baked fields laden with toxic pesticides, doing hard labor few adults would choose to do.

We are not talking here about family farms. Senate Bill 707 – like every other proposal to bring child labor standards out of the 19th century – explicitly allows children to work on farms owned or operated by relatives. Unfortunately, this truth is routinely ignored or misrepresented, allowing legislators to brush off these reforms as threats to an American institution and parental rights.

There is no moral justification for child labor in any industry, but the economic justification is a wickedly powerful one. The denial of child labor, wage, housing and other legal rights to farmworkers – rights enjoyed by workers in every other industry in America – allows agricultural corporations to keep their labor costs at rock bottom. Growers have no control over the cost of seeds, pesticides or heavy equipment. But with the help of friendly legislators, they can hold down labor costs by taking advantage of the men, women and children who work their fields.

We understand the political realities that lawmakers face. Agribusiness carries a big stick in states like North Carolina. Fortunately, there is something the legislature can do this session to protect farmworker children from being further exploited from trafficking and sexual violence. As reported by Human Rights Watch last year, farmworking girls are subject to unwanted touching, stalking and rape. In a March 2012 Indy Week report corroborated by the nonprofit farmworker advocacy group NC Field, a 16-year-old girl tells of two young girls at one camp being offered as prostitutes to their supervisor.

Senate Bill 683, the so-called Safe Harbor Act, aims to protect victims of human trafficking and the prostitution of minors. The inclusion of simple, sensible provisions will extend this protection to children in our state who need it most.

One provision guarantees that farmworkers may receive visits during nonworking hours from church, charitable and nonprofit organizations for health care, education and other services. Another requires that the Polaris Sex Trafficking hotline be posted in migrant camps. Others require locks for doors and windows of farmworker sleeping areas and locked storage for farmworker valuables such as passports so they cannot be held to exert control.

Too many school kids are working in fields when they should be doing homework. And too many 10-, 11-, 12- and 13-year-old girls are at risk of sexual violence while helping to support their families. Our legislature is empowered to change these realities right now with bills like 707 and 683.

Melinda Wiggins is executive director of Student Action with Farmworkers, a nonprofit based in Durham.

Flawed study seeks to justify discrimination against U.S. workers

By Lori Johnson | Originally posted at NC Policy Watch

If there is a dominant myth in the debate over America’s treatment of the men and women who harvest our food, it is that U.S. workers won’t take these jobs. A recent study by a researcher named Michael Clemens at the Center for Global Development (CGD), a Washington, DC think tank, and released by the Rupert Murdoch backed Partnership for a New American Economy, makes just such a claim.

The study, which was picked up by media outlets around the country, concludes erroneously that unemployed U.S. workers aren't taking farmworker jobs and therefore don't require much in the way of legal protections.

Unfortunately, the study’s conclusions are demonstrably false and based on faulty information.

Set in North Carolina, the study outright ignores the existence of virtually all the U.S. workers doing farm work in North Carolina. For 2010, the study accounts for only 74 workers, less than one percent of the U.S. workers referred to farm jobs through the North Carolina Division of Employment Security (DES) alone.

The study is limited to farms that bring in foreign labor through the federal H-2A visa program and then only to jobs with the North Carolina Growers' Association (NCGA), a labor broker that charges farms to bring in foreign H-2A labor. Yet NCGA's U.S. worker recruitment outcomes are hardly representative. With four-fifths of the H-2A jobs in North Carolina last year, it received only one-fifth of job service U.S. worker H-2A referrals.

The study falsely presumes that the lack of U.S. workers on H-2A farms is due to worker choice. It even claims that there is "extensive coordination" between NCGA and the state Job Service agency, which is supposed to help connect unemployed workers to jobs.

The reality is some Job Service officials are loathe to refer U.S. farmworkers to H-2A positions, which require much more paperwork. Recently, when an American brought three H-2A job orders to a local Job Service agent, the agent threw the orders in the trash.  When another U.S. citizen sought tobacco work, the Job Services official told her "I don't do H-2A, it's too complicated." Other examples of this kind of treatment abound.

Indeed, the CGD study is based on a time period when Job Service offices were operating under a 2007 U.S. Department of Labor directive to avoid referring US workers to H-2A jobs. The study assumes that a lack of increased referrals during the recession means U.S. workers are not responsive to market forces, ignoring the counteracting force of this federal directive in place during the same time period.

Most U.S. workers don't even know these jobs exist. Several Job Service offices don't post NCGA jobs in the county of actual employment. Instead, the "master job orders,” with information on jobs throughout the state, are posted in the county where NCGA’s headquarters is located. This means that a man who conducts a Job Service database search for work in his home county doesn't even see the available NCGA positions.

There are reasons to doubt the study's claim that few Americans finished the season. The federal Office of the Inspector General (OIG) audited the NCGA and found the NCGA had used a false end date that included late season sweet potato work not available to most workers. The OIG determined it was impossible for most workers, foreign or domestic, to "finish the season."

The study presumes higher turnover is the worker's fault. With many tactics in the playbook of how to get rid of the U.S. workers, perhaps turnover was the goal. Legal Aid of North Carolina has represented U.S. workers at different employers who claimed that the H-2A workforce was given preferential treatment.

Why not welcome U.S. workers? Well, for starters, a foreign labor broker's entire business model depends on Americans not being available. Each U.S. worker hired means reduced profit.

In addition, foreign H-2A workers are exempt from certain core federal worker protection laws and cannot lawfully work anywhere but the farm to which they are assigned.

Perhaps most importantly, though, is the fact that foreign workers are less likely to complain if not paid or treated properly because they fear losing their visa. Add to this the fact that the H-2A program also allows growers to custom pick a workforce that is male and young and unburdened by local family responsibilities and it’s no wonder U.S. workers face such discrimination.

As noted, the study recommends further reducing protections for U.S. workers.

Ignoring all the counteracting factors, the study concludes that U.S. workers won't respond to increased wages or improved working conditions. And of course this “logic” flies in the face of basic market rules that tie supply to better wages and working conditions.    

The truth is there are many workers – both U.S. citizens and authorized aliens – that need and want agricultural jobs. And should immigration reform proposals currently before Congress pass, there will be many more legal workers.

The existence of foreign labor and the need to protect U.S. workers are not mutually exclusive. Let’s hope the public isn't fooled by this ill-conceived and badly-flawed effort to cloak discrimination against American workers.  

"God Made a Farmer" - But What About Farmworkers?

Originally published by the North Carolina Council of Churches: www.ncchurches.org/2013/02/god-made-a-farmer-but-what-about-farmworkers

As I watched the Super Bowl with my family on Sunday night, one ad stood out. It was the beautiful slideshow of farmers, accompanied by the eloquent words of the late Paul's Harvey's speech entitled "God Made a Farmer." The ad was a moving tribute, evoking powerful emotions while praising the often unrewarding daily labor of farming.

Here's an excerpt from Harvey's words:

"God said, 'I need somebody willing to get up before dawn, milk cows, work all day in the fields, milk cows again, eat supper, then go to town and stay past midnight at a meeting of the school board.' So God made a farmer."

Again, it was a beautiful - almost haunting - two minutes. But why were all the farmers white? Why didn't the ad depict the reality of farmworkers, the millions of men and women whose hard labor makes possible the abundance on our plates?

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers Responds

A recent story about "God Made a Farmer" by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers highlights this disconnect and why it's wrong:

The vision of rural America at the heart of the ad -- the visual definition of the farmer God made that is the subject of the two minute poem -- is, almost without exception, monochrome as can be. Out of 21 images of people representing farmers, 19 are white, one is African American, one is Latino...

Today, the vast majority of physical labor done on the vast majority of commercial fruit and vegetable farms in this country is done by farmworkers -- the vast, vast majority of whom are not white. There are more than 3 million farmworkers toiling on farms in rural communities from California to Florida and everywhere in between, yet, in an ad extolling the virtues of farm work, the people who work on farms are almost nowhere to be found.

It is not wrong to extol the labor, daily sacrifices, and invaluable contribution to American life of our nation's farmworkers. It is wrong to paint farmworkers white in order to do so.

The reality is that farmworkers pick the food we eat, and most of those workers are immigrant workers whose backbreaking labor -- the selfsame noble labor exalted in the ad's moving words -- is systematically underpaid and underappreciated. If the words read so powerfully by Paul Harvey are able to reach deep inside of us and move us to buy a truck, they should be powerful enough to move us to reward the work of our country's 3 million farmworkers and provide a living wage and dignified working conditions in return for their virtuous labor.

God Made a Farmer, and Farmworkers Too

God Made a Farmer, and Farmworkers Too. Photo by Peter Eversoll.

The lack of farmworkers in the ad is frankly a stunning omission, and it highlights the challenges that face farmworkers today. Farmworkers are routinely ignored in the policy debates that affect their lives. And it turns out that even tributes to hard work on farms, like the "God Made a Farmer" ad, fail to honor the contributions of farmworkers. It's up to us to help turn the tide. It's time we recognize that God made farmers and God made farmworkers too.

Got food? Thank a farmworker.

-Chris Liu-Beers, Program Associate

Immigration Reform and Farmworkers

Last week, President Obama and members of Congress have been laying out their principles for comprehensive immigration reform. Millions of families' lives hang in the balance, including farmworkers across the country. Our food system relies heavily on an undocumented, marginalized workforce to provide the necessary labor for growing fruits and vegetables. It's vital that any serious reform include provisions for protecting all workers - including farmworkers - from discrimination and unfair treatment. Farmworkers should be included along with all other immigrants in the roadmap to citizenship. 

Bruce Goldstein, President of Farmworker Justice, made the following statement:

With the announcement yesterday of a bipartisan group of Senators and today’s speech by President Obama, momentum is building to pass immigration reform that includes a roadmap to citizenship.

Our nation depends on the hard labor of farmworkers to cultivate and harvest our crops. Meanwhile, the majority of these workers live in poverty, unable to afford the very fruits and vegetables they harvest. Immigration reform is desperately needed to empower farmworkers to improve their wages and working conditions, as the majority lack immigration status.

Farmworker Justice welcomes the President’s commitment to passing immigration reform. We will encourage the President and Congress to promote immigration policies that enable current and future farmworkers to attain a roadmap to citizenship. To ensure fair treatment of farmworkers and our nation’s food security, we will continue to advocate for equal labor protections for farmworkers in any immigration reform.