Young farmworkers: "Overworked and under spray"
source: http://www.panna.org/blog/guest-blog-young-farmworkers-are-overworked-under-spray
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- JanforGore
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Last week Toxic Free North Carolina released our latest Farm Worker Documentary Project film, Overworked & Under Spray. It’s a short piece featuring six high school-aged farmworkers’ stories about being sprayed with agricultural pesticides while tending crops in fields across the state.
For two months this summer, I crisscrossed the eastern side of North Carolina with our Student Action with Farmworkers intern Abi Bissette. We visited farmworker families in their homes, giving out pesticide safety information and discussing their rights as farmworkers. By midsummer we had assembled a group of motivated, articulate teenagers willing to speak out on film.
The young farmworkers cultivated and harvested blueberries, strawberries, sweet potatoes, green beans, grapes, cucumbers and tobacco. Here’s Felix Rodriguez, one of the youth featured in the film:
You could see the spray coming at you...but we kept on working. The next day I didn't feel so good. I wouldn't feel comfortable talking about pesticides to the owner or supervisor because they'll see you as nagging. They just really want you to work.
Enough is enough
When we asked the youth how they would fix the situation, they had a lot of impressively astute answers: put more inspectors in the fields, get rid of child labor in agriculture, make stronger regulations for crew leaders. But one message we heard loud and clear from everyone interviewed was “enough is enough.”
The exploitation of children (or anyone) for cheap food — and the poisoning of the people who work to fill our grocery store shelves — has gone on far too long. It’s time for eaters of conscience to demand an end to abusive, toxic agriculture.
More at the link
For two months this summer, I crisscrossed the eastern side of North Carolina with our Student Action with Farmworkers intern Abi Bissette. We visited farmworker families in their homes, giving out pesticide safety information and discussing their rights as farmworkers. By midsummer we had assembled a group of motivated, articulate teenagers willing to speak out on film.
The young farmworkers cultivated and harvested blueberries, strawberries, sweet potatoes, green beans, grapes, cucumbers and tobacco. Here’s Felix Rodriguez, one of the youth featured in the film:
You could see the spray coming at you...but we kept on working. The next day I didn't feel so good. I wouldn't feel comfortable talking about pesticides to the owner or supervisor because they'll see you as nagging. They just really want you to work.
Enough is enough
When we asked the youth how they would fix the situation, they had a lot of impressively astute answers: put more inspectors in the fields, get rid of child labor in agriculture, make stronger regulations for crew leaders. But one message we heard loud and clear from everyone interviewed was “enough is enough.”
The exploitation of children (or anyone) for cheap food — and the poisoning of the people who work to fill our grocery store shelves — has gone on far too long. It’s time for eaters of conscience to demand an end to abusive, toxic agriculture.
More at the link
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- groups:
- Green, Earth and Science, Sustainable Agriculture, Earth Care, 4 more
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- tags:
- Environment, Health, Monsanto, Toxic, 10 more
