LA Times Reveals Disturbing Investigative Report on the Living Conditions in Mexico’s Megafarms

One of the increasingly difficult aspects about trying to lead a socially and environmentally conscious lifestyle is discovering articles like NPR’s “Mexican Megafarms Supply U.S. Market Are Rife with Labor Abuses” and the LA times “Product of Mexico” investigative series. After a while, it starts to feel like no foods are safe. What can one person do about the living conditions of farms in a different country? Well, I don’t know if it’ll help – but I plan to write letters to all of the companies names in this report and tell them that as a customer I demand more oversight of the companies from which they receive their produce.

The folks involved in the investigative series spent 18 months traveling around Mexico and doing other research looking into the country’s “Megafarms.” Almost, if not all, of these farms export produce to the United States and have received some sort of acknowledgement for their food safety and product quality. What’s there to complain about then, right? Well, turns out that while these Megafarms produce wonderful produce, they provide absolutely horrible living conditions to their workers.

From the series, the rooms that laborers work in can be summarized as roughly 6’’x8’’,populated by up to six adults, made of concrete with no windows or furniture; most don’t have furniture or blankets. Makeshift beds are made with cardboard.

The workers, typically indigenous folk from the surrounding area, leave their families for months at a time to make more than what they would elsewhere ($8 to $12 a day). They’ve given three meals a day, but they’re so stark that most end up being left hungry or buy food from the farm’s company store which has inflated prices, making it difficult for the workers to keep up with the high cost, despite their pay.

The LA Times reporter, Ricardo Martinez says he went to a number of different farms while working on this series and found that at some farms, people were actually being held captive. At others, their pay was being withheld until the end of their 3 month contract (so that they couldn’t leave the compound).

Many of these farms have contracts with companies like Safeway, Subway, and Whole Foods. All of which have commented on the LA Times findings reporting that they all have various codes of conduct written into their contracts assuring that supplies will provide a safe and health work environment. While I’m sure this is the case, it’s clear that not one of these companies has followed up with the farms to make sure that this code of conduct is being followed. In this case, whose responsibility is this? Should Whole Foods visit each farm that they contract with to ensure that conditions are favorable for the food and employees? Can Whole Foods now sue Rene XX because they clearly disregarded a portion of their contract? The article later touches on this:

Strict U.S. laws govern the safety and cleanliness of imported fruits and vegetables. To meet those standards, retailers and distributors send inspectors to Mexico to examine fields, greenhouses and packing plants. The companies say they are also committed to workers’ well-being and cite their ethical sourcing guidelines. Retailers increasingly promote the idea that the food they sell not only is tasty and healthful but was produced without exploiting workers.

But at many big corporations, enforcement of those standards is weak to nonexistent, and often relies on Mexican growers to monitor themselves, The Times found.

To further drive this home, I’ve included some of the conditions that were revealed by Martinez’ investigation in bullets point below:

• Many farm laborers are trapped for months at a time in rat-infested camps, often without beds and sometimes without functioning toiles or a reliable water supply.
  • At 15 of the 30 camps that the LA times visited, laborers wages were withheld or they owed money to the company, making it impossible for them to leave.
  • In addition to that, Bioparques de Occidente not only withheld wages but kept hundreds of workers in labor camp against their will and beat some who tried to escape.
• Due to the high prices of food at the company stores, it’s common for laborers to return home penniless at the end of the harvest.
  • Some workers hunt for scraps around the farm because they can’t afford the food at the company store.
• When in the camps, laborers are surrounded by guards, barbed-wire fences and the present threat of violence from camp supervisors.
• Child labor is still present on many small and mid-sized farmers. The report estimates that about 100,000 children up to 14 years of age pick crops for pay.

One of the statements that struck me most in this report was “The U.S. companies linked to Agricola San Emilio through distributors have plenty of rules, but they serve mainly to protect American consumers, not field hands.” I want to hope that these regulations are the way they are because American companies assume that laborers will be provided with a decent place to sleep, food, and clean water. If this isn’t the case, is this what we’ve come to? I understand the importance of monitoring our food to make sure that it’s safe – but not at the expense of people’s dignity. I can only assume that the proceeds the megafarms are bringing in and those supermarkets that sale them could afford to work out a better way to meet their quota. Or, I’m happy to pay more for my peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes if it means improving the lives of those who work so hard to produce food that I greatly appreciate.

In the last decade, farm exports from Mexico to the US has tripled to $7.6 million. With that much money, surely these megafarms can afford some work reforms, don’t you think?