People Putting Food First #96
1. Migrant Workers Campaign To Be Treated As Human Beings
2. Graton, California day laborers organize for better working conditions
3. Online Microcredit: A Double-Edged Sword
Speak Out
1.Migrant Workers Campaign To Be Treated As Human Beings
Now that the 2007 immigration bill has died with little hope of change until 2009, farm workers who pick almost all of the vegetables, fruits, and nuts grown in the U.S. remain vulnerable to abuse, intimidation and exploitation. Working conditions are often hazardous and payment for labor is sometimes denied, or so low that workers are forced to live outdoors in makeshift camps.
Baldemar Velásquez, President of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee (FLOC), recently announced a new campaign to stop the senseless death of fathers and mothers. He claims that migrants have the right to organize and demand to be treated as human beings. FLOC, is both a social movement and a labor union that works with agricultural migrant workers. FLOC emphasizes in human rights as the standard and self-determination as the process for achieving these rights.
Velásquez said “every ounce of food that [is] on our tables, that feeds our families… is made available by the toil and sweat of these men and women. Yet, while they pick all the food that we eat, they go home and fall asleep with empty stomach. They struggle with working conditions that any decent person would agree no human being should be forced to endure.”
After unjust deaths of several migrant workers, FLOC is challenging the deplorable conditions of this workforce that remains voiceless, powerless, and invisible to mainstream America.
The FLOC works primarily in the Midwest. http://www.floc.com/
The UFW campaigns to protect farm workers, primarily in California. http://www.ufw.org/
Coalition of Immokalee Workers is in Florida. http://www.ciw-online.org/
The Border Agricultural Workers Project. http://www.farmworkers.org/bawppage.html
Food First will lead a tour on immigrants and the struggle for food sovereignty beginning with a visit with the farmworkers of the Border Agricultural Workers Project in El Paso, Texas on July 29, 2007.
2. Graton, California Day Laborers Organize for Better Working Conditions
In the midst of debates about immigration, residents in Graton, California actively addressed immigration and day labor in their community by creating the Centro Laboral de Graton (CLG) in 2000. To protect and improve the civil rights of day workers, CLG has set-up an official hiring process that establishes accountability for both employers and laborers, whose work hours and incomes have risen.
A hiring site, now a table on a main street corner, but soon to be a physical center, reduces the number of workers waiting on street corners for contractors to swing by. Hiring site coordinator, Davin Cardenas, facilitates translation, making it easier to connect employers with workers who have specific skills.
Democratic participation is key in CLG. Leadership trainings are weekly, and laborers also sit on the board of directors. English proficiency, a top priority of members, as well has health services, job-skill workshops, and safety classes are offered to workers while they wait for employment opportunities and on weekends. Volunteers and organizations, such as the Southwest Community Health Clinic, teach and hold the clinics.
Additionally, to incorporate a broader residential perspective, CLG meets regularly with community groups using a consensus method to progress as a community supported organization.
If you would like more information: http://www.gratondaylaborg.org.
Or, to find a center in your own community contact the National Labor Organizing Network: http//:ndon.org.
3. Online Microcredit: A Double-Edged Sword
Microcredit operations have been given a publicity boost as of late. Beginning with the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize Award to Bangladesh’s Mohammed Yunus, founder of the Grameen Bank and one of the first bankers to recognize the potential of small loans to local business ventures, microfinance became a household word. Now, with the recent popularity of online lending sites such as Kiva (www.kiva.org) and NamasteDirect (www.namaste-direct.org), even suburban housewives can lend a hand to global poverty alleviation and foster a sense of self-sufficiency in the Global South.
One recent lender on Kiva.org’s online fund manager, Ara Chakrabarti, was motivated to lend directly because, he says, “all it takes is someone to front the capital needed for even the smallest business ventures to become successful.” Spurred by a recent PBS Frontline documentary detailing the success of microcredit operations and praising Kiva for its mission to match individual donors with loan recipients on a personal basis, he decided to join the online network to “teach people how to take a small investment, grow their business and eventually become self-sufficient.”
To some, microcredit sounds like a miraculous panacea to world development. The availability of online lending sites abound, represented by such sites as Nobel winner Yunus’s Grameen Foundation (www.grameenfoundation.org) and Global Giving (www.globalgiving.org). Amidst the popularity and political conversions (Sen. Hilary Clinton speaks frequently about the power of microcredit to “transform lives and revolutionize societies”), a growing number of concerns have been raised about the sustainability of such operations; especially with respect to long-lasting poverty alleviation targeting the world’s poorest.
Microcredit’s critics argue that besides the myriad of problems relating to exorbitant interest rates and hoax financing schemes (in 2002 Kenyan government officials conducted a series of bank foreclosures on the basis of deposit-taking scams), there is a graver issue with the “gospel of small lending.” Economic journalist Gina Neff has been quoted in The Nation saying that “after eight years of borrowing, 55% of Grameen households still aren't able to meet their basic nutritional needs—so many women are using their loans to buy food rather than invest in business.” This brings into question the social mobility of loan recipients, especially the poorest of the poor. Scholars argue that microcredit is more often used by business-owners as a form of disposable income—allowing access to a lump sum of money previously unavailable, rather than being reinvested into the business.
Development expert, Thomas Dichter, has noted “[microcredit clients] are living in economic environments that do not provide them with opportunities, that do not offer them the protections and encouragements of a system of institutions that functions even remotely well,” and are thus only temporarily helped by capital investment. As is so often the case, those who would really benefit from microlending are not in a position to utilize these resources, at least not until the dominant structures of inequality are broken down, and that can only be accomplished through capital-intensive, government-driven development.”
Speak Out—Members and Subscribers
It seems that the organic label has been co-opted by agribusiness simply to inflate profits. It no longer means that workers are treated decently, but instead, hypes the personal health angle to extract a premium price. In fact, organic can be counter-indicative of the small family farms and native co-ops that I want to support, because they’re not big enough to pay the USDA fees and lawyers. Whole Foods, a prime example of organic profiteering, is scheduled to move into Santa Cruz. But already, Trader Joe’s and Staff of Life are business-as-usual models catering to a health-conscious market. The only local groceries in which the fair trade conversation happens is New Leaf.
Even there, it's hard to tell who's who. "Eco-regional" helps, but that includes EarthBound Farms, whose marketing staff puts a friendly face on labor abuse. Odwalla may be right here in Davenport, but not even their website mentions that Coca-Cola owns them. Tonight, I was talking about child slavery in cocoa while righteously munching on Seeds of Change. Oops! Owned by M&M/Mars. I've suggested to New Leaf that they label the brand owner on the shelf. Like their fish, color-coded by sustainability, it would let me at least make an informed decision.
My personal feeling is that if a company cares about their workers, I trust them to not mistreat animals, the environment, or me as a consumer. I don’t need all the certifications, rules and regulations. Forget organic, just tell me who they really are and what they're doing to make things better. I’d like to suggest this movement away from certification as the Eco-Humane Campaign. Because if others are suffering for our food choices, no pricey labels are ever going to keep us safe.
Tereza Coraggio, Food First member, Santa Cruz, California
tereza at retrometro.com
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This issue of People Putting Food First was written by Leonor Hurtardo, Trisha Chakrabarti, and Rachel Fields.