This Labor Day CSA week I don't want you to think about us (yes, we work on Labor Day, the produce still needs to be harvested and I can't get Haley out the door at 9:50 on Tuesday unless our whole team does most of the harvest, wash and pack on Monday).
I want you to think about the farm laborers working on the industrialized farms across our country, many of them migrant laborers with the bare minimum of legal protections, many of them working in life-threatening conditions like poor air quality from forest fires and temperatures over 100 degrees for their entire shift. Our grocery stores are stocked because there are people who we, as a global community, are willing to lean on for their labor and expertise, but are unwilling to provide with safe working conditions, fair compensation, access to healthcare and in the case of the United States, citizenship.
The United Farm Workers Alliance has been working for years to create a path to citizenship for migrant farm workers. I strongly suggest checking out their
social media. They post submissions from alliance members from the fields - picking grapes, pruning apples, harvesting onions - it really humanizes the people who grow our food. Just this year, the
house passed The Farm Workforce Modernization Act of 2021 which would provide a pathway to citizenship for agricultural workers.
They are also working to pass legislation that would make a new California law that protects farm workers from extreme temperatures a federal law. This is what they say on their website:
"The bills -- fittingly called the "Asuncion Valdivia Heat Illness and Fatality Prevention Act" -- were named after a 53-year-old farm worker who died in July 2004. He collapsed from heat stroke after working a 10-hour day picking grapes in the 100-degree sun. No ambulance responded because employees were unable to provide the vineyard's location. Asuncion died in the car as his son tried frantically to reach a hospital.
In recent years, record-high temperatures have been seen across the country. The summer of 2020 set new heat records throughout the nation for both high temperatures and number of days at extreme high temperatures -- including the hottest temperature on the planet in more than a century. We must protect the hard working people who put food on our tables."
The New York Times also ran an article, "When Hard Jobs Turn Hazardous" this weekend highlighting the dangerous working conditions that many farmworkers are facing as a result of Climate Change.
I love what I do. I work hard, but it is always my choice - it would be a mess but I could walk away tomorrow and come out virtually unscathed. And I am still currently dependent on the global food system and the labor of those I will never know, who do not have a choice, but to keep showing up. Let's not forget that supporting small, local farms in only a tiny portion of the advocacy needed for a just and sustainable food system.
