Forget about fair-trade coffee. What about fair-trade tomatoes?

That’s right, you read that correctly. Instead of buying coffee from fair-trade farmers in countries most people cannot find on a map, let’s stop and serisouly consider an appalling reality in our own country, the U.S. of A.

Last Thursday, while driving home from a substitute teaching job, I heard one of the more intense news reports on NPR (National Public Radio.) The title of the piece was “Indentured Servitude Persists in Florida’s Fields.” Over the course of a 17-minute report and interview, I found myself both frightened and disgusted with the evils of capitalism in our country. As the title suggests, the report investigated the exploitation of vulnerable peoples for the sake of indentured servitude on Florida’s farms.

It is widely known that many migrant workers are not U.S. citizens. Sadly, I have accepted the reality that many of these laborers are exploited for cheap labor. Embedded in the convenience of modern food production is the mantra of capitalist beliefs – lower production costs to raise overall profit. The use of chemicals and machinery to produce our foods are commonly associated with this convenience. And so it is with great shock and sadness that I consider the lives of the worker – in this case, the tomato and citrus pickers.

This brief report on NPR opened my eyes to the serious issue of knowing where our food comes from. To be honest, I thought I had a pretty good understanding of the issue. (Well, I guess not.) It turns out that even canned foods require the critical eye we throw on conventional meat and dairy products. Here its not about animal cruelty but human cruelty.

According to the report, 90% of the tomatoes we purchase in the grocery store or at a restaurant come from Florida. If anything, let’s recognize this – the majority of tomatoes in our mouths and cupboards come from Florida. That is a HUGE amount of tomatoes. This includes whole tomatoes, canned tomatoes, those used in ketchup and pastes, those found in fast-food restaurants and Safeways, Walmarts and Kmarts, etc. Well, it turns out, that an estimated 5% of the tomato fields and citrus groves (think fruit and all types of citrus juices) are “employing” indentured servants to work the fields.

Let me repeat this statistic. It is estimated that five percent of the tomatoes and citrus fruits that come from Florida are harvested by slaves. Slaves! The appropriate term is indentured servant – a phrase you may remember from history class in high school, when you learned about slaves in the South during the 18th and 19th centuries in America. An indentured servant is someone under contract by an employer who works until a certain debt is paid off. The technical difference between this and a slave is the opportunity to work off the debt. The reality is that the owner determines the wage and thus determines the time frame of servitude. In Florida today, indentured servitude is used by employers to ensure cheap labor.

In some cases, tomato pickers will work 7 days a week to try and pay off the debt. Maybe the owner also supplies food, shelter and transportation. The next thing you know, the paycheck only covers the expenses made by the owner instead of paying off the debt. It’s like you work all day everyday to earn just enough money to pay rent and buy food. No money accumulates for paying off the debt. This is where servitude becomes slavery.

According to the report on NPR, there have been about a dozen cases of indentured servitude on tomato and citrus groves. It’s likely that there are many more cases of this but the main source of information is the freed servant. As you might expect, once freed, that person will do what he or she can to not get caught again. Since many of the slaves are not citizens, there is the added fear of deportation and incarceration. Consequently, there are less cases brought to court. Nonetheless, some of the recent cases that have come to light are significant discoveries.

For example, in the most recent case, it was found that workers were chained and beaten; and kept inside a U-Haul truck where there was no bathroom but a corner to urinate and defecate. No matter how you look at it, these are slave conditions. Is this an extreme case? Maybe. Are there more cases like this? Possibly. What really gets me is our collective memory on slavery – specifically, that slavery ended with the Civil War. This is not the case and it must be known.

Throughout my interest in eating healthy food I have been cognizant of the worker rights piece. At times, the food movement shines the spotlight on barbaric working conditions, but lately most of the attention goes to caged animals and contaminated vegetables. Its deeply upsetting how little we, as a nation of food consumers, consider the lives of the workers who grew or harvested or butchered our food. I think our ignorance on that matter is partly due to racism. We all know that the folks fulfilling these jobs are either illegal immigrants or new immigrants with minimal language skills or education. The “immigration issue” in our country is so intwined with our economy and yet we are unwilling to accept the real cost of our consumer needs.

There’s a reason why tomatoes or other fruits are cheap year-round. Yes, produce is cheap because chemicals are used to ensure expedient and larger-than-normal growth. The price of produce is also lowered by the industrialization of our food and the technological “innovations” that have enabled more food to be grown with less energy used. And now, a third piece is thrown into the fray. Food is cheap because the workers are exploited. There is no insurance or retirement plan even though the work is incredibly dangerous. There is no push to provide real livable wages because than corporations won’t make enough money to provide multi-million dollar bonuses. And ultimately, if the worker is not white and not a citizen, than why care?

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Please listen to the report. I promise it will open your eyes and hearts. The pursuit of local, seasonal and ethically-grown food is not just about individual health and the environment. This is also a movement for justice, equity and human rights. I think its time we consider the lives of the worker when we purchase “healthy foods.”

Related posts:

1. Are my tomatoes picked by slaves?
2. The Pains of Eliminating (weekly menu 19)
3. Capitalism vs. Environmentalism
4. Why “organic” isn’t good enough (or) the versatility of the tomato
5. Urban farming, Low-Income Communities and Burgeoning Dietary Epidemics

Tags: food literacy, Food Politics, food safety, local food movement, seasonal eating, tomato