Hungry Harvesters
Plenty for some. Poverty for others. On today's industrial farms, field workers harvest crops that they themselves can't afford to buy. Join us as we ask how much we're willing to pay for our food to assure that those who fill our plates are paid enough to eat what they harvest.
Click on a program topic to hear audio with voices and stories behind the issues.
Use the study guides to inform yourself about the topic and learn the skills of innovation, including:
- Creative problem-solving
- Strategic thinking
- Entrepreneurial initiative
- Collaborative design
In addition:
- Explore other audio, video and print resources on the topic
- Use the suggested activities to put innovation into action in your community
- Choose from a menu of options to adapt the materials to your specific learning and teaching objectives.
Francisca Cortes
Coalition of Immokaless Workers, a community-based worker organization. (8:06)
Steven Grover
Vice President of Food Safety, Quality Insurance and Regulatory Compliance for Burger King. (5:47)
Andrea Hinojosa
Southeast Georgia Communities Project, building bridges among migrant farmworkers, farmers, local citizens, service providers and legal advocates. (2:01)
Hungry Harvesters:
Migrant Labor and the Poverty that Produces Our Plenty
Study and Resource Guide
Community Outcomes and Learning Goals:
· Explore the working conditions of migrant farm workers and the relationship between worker, grower, and distributor.
· Gain awareness of the challenges facing workers, growers, and distributors concerning the migrant labor pool.
· Consider how our individual and collective choices perpetuate and/or can improve the current system.
· Teach innovation skills to devise new and more effective approaches to migrant farm labor through creative problem solving, collaborative design, entrepreneurial initiative and strategic thinking.
Listening/ Comprehension Questions
Before Listening
1. Have you, or has anyone you’ve known, ever worked on a farm? What is farm labor like? How might your experience differ from that of migrant farm workers as portrayed in “Hungry Harvesters”?
During/After Listening
1. Who is Francisca Cortes? How does she describe the labor conditions for migrant workers? Who is Steven Grover? What is his description of the conditions and how does his description differ from hers?
2. According to Francisca Cortes, why does the presence of a supervisor or government inspector having a supervisor and/or government investigator not help much to ensure that migrant workers are treated fairly and their working conditions are acceptable?
3. According to Burger King’s Steven Grover, why has the company not met the demands of Francisca Cortes’ organization, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW)?
4. Photojournalist David Bacon asserts that migrant workers have very little leverage in organizing themselves and demanding better pay. Why is this so, according to Mr. Bacon?
Critical Thinking and Discussion Questions
1. Francisca Cortes and Steven Grover see the same situation through very different lenses and life experiences. Where are their points of disagreement? Where are their points of common interest? Do you agree with one more so than the other? On which points and why?
2. Francisca Cortes’ organization, CIW, wants fast food chains to take greater responsibility for working conditions on the farms of those who supply their product. Should they bear this responsibility? Why not growers? What about individual consumers? Who is truly responsible here and to what degree? Who should be?
3. Mark Sommer asks farm worker advocate Andrea Hinojosa what she would do if she were in a position to make policy in relation to migrant labor. She responds by distinguishing between different kinds of farm workers. “Weed ‘em out…deport those with criminal backgrounds… [but] not the hardworking family that is trying to make it…” What are your thoughts on this issue? Consider David Bacon’s argument – that migrant workers are essential to growing and harvesting most of our food crops. How many farms could function without migrant labor? What would happen to food costs if we had no migrant labor?
4. Francisca Cortes asserts that migrant workers are not paid enough while Steven Grover argues that they only work three months out of a year and therefore, are well compensated considering the time they work. What is your feeling on this issue and why?
Experiential Learning
1. Farm for a Day: Visit a local farm and volunteer for the day. What was the day like? What were the activities? The working conditions? Was it harder or easier than you imagined? Which tasks were hardest? Which were most rewarding? Journal your experience and share it with a group.
2. Raising Grain: Individually or with a small group, assume you are a worker earning minimum wage for an eight- to ten-hour day. Create a budget reflecting your earnings, minus taxes, for a family of four (Husband, wife, two children). Use the average cost of living for your community and include approximations for housing, utilities, transportation, groceries, medical, etc. On these wages, could you afford to buy food at a local farmers’ market? Consider using this cost of living calculator (http://cgi.money.cnn.com/tools/costofliving/costofliving.html) or your own cost of living tool to determine actual budget figures.
3. Voices from the Field: Research and collect poems, songs, and other artistic representations from authors/artists that are representative of migrant farm workers. What are the common themes among the pieces you find? You may use David Bacon’s website and photographs to begin this project at http://www.DBacon.igc.org
Crossing the Line Activity
Lesson Objectives:
· Explore issues of access, health, and community as they are related to migrant farm labor in the United States.
· Develop critical thinking and problem solving skills through an inquiry based process
Materials Needed:
· Educast/Food, Sustainability and Society: Hungry Harvesters: Migrant Labor and the Poverty that Produces Our Plenty.
· Student Worksheets
· One to two class periods
Procedure
- Ask students to listen to the Educast: Hungry Harvesters, paying particular attention to the concepts of access to food (both geographic and economic), health and nutrition, and community as they listen. They may take as many notes as they would like during the Educast, as key points may aid them during this exercise.
- Divide the room/seating into two halves, facing one another. On one side of the room, place a sign that is labeled “TRUE” and on the other, a sign labeled “FALSE”. Instructors may even use a piece of thick tape/duct tape to create a visual “line” down the middle of the room.
- Provide students with accompanying worksheet of true/false statements and ask them to decide individually whether each statement is true or false, making notes as they like.
- Introduce the first statement and ask those who found it to be “true” to sit on the side of the room labeled “true” and vice versa.
- Students may then take turns defending their stance. During the process, should any one student become convinced that a point made by the other side is, in fact, the better point, they may move seats, or defect. Where students are positioned near or far from the line can indicate how strong their belief/conviction is concerning the statement. As students from “the other side” talk, those across the line may move closer or further away from the center line, denoting how their perspectives are shifting, if in fact they are.
- Facilitate this discussion, using your time allowance for each question as appropriate.
- After the debate, ask students to reflect (reflection worksheet provided) on the issue and their thoughts during the debate. Debrief with the group as a whole: What additional questions were raised? What issues were most important to you during this exercise? What issues need further consideration? What solutions, if any, can you see as a result of this discussion?
Food, Sustainability and Society: Hungry Harvesters
TRUE/FALSE: For each of the statements below, decide whether you feel it is “true” or “false”. You may make notes to support your claim, but you must decide one or the other – there is no gray area during this debate.
1. Migrant labor conditions in the United States are acceptable.
2. Those working illegally in the United States should be treated the same as U.S. Citizens in terms of pay and working conditions.
3. Migrant laborers are illegal immigrants
4. U.S. agriculture depends on migrant labor.
5. Our food would cost more without migrant workers.
6. Migrant workers take jobs away from American citizens.
7. Burger King and other consumers should be held responsible for fair labor and pay policies concerning migrant workers.
8. Migrant workers are paid enough.
9. Improving labor conditions and pay for migrant workers would be worth the cost of produce rising.
10. Fair wages need to be worked out between employer and worker. The buyer and consumer should not be involved.
11. The federal government should do more to ensure regulation of workers, both in terms of legality and conditions.
12. The United States needs migrant labor in order to sustain itself.
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