On an early February morning just east of Florida’s I-75, sea fog lies low over the fields. It nearly obscures the farmworkers, ghost-like, bent over as they harvest the winter crops. Though the sun’s just coming up, they’ve been laboring for hours.
“It’s cool in the early morning, but even the winters are getting warmer,” said Jeannie Economos, project coordinator with the Farmworker Association of Florida. “By the afternoon, it will be in the 80s in the sun.”
Most people are unaware that the abundant produce available in modern supermarkets—tomatoes, strawberries, even oranges—is all picked by hand. And because farmworkers are often paid by the piece, they pick as fast as they can, even when that means neglecting to take breaks and drinking water. Even nursery workers do piecework, especially in Florida where the nation’s ornamental plant industry has skyrocketed. When it’s hot, the stress of this rapid harvesting takes a hefty toll on the body.
[For more on this story by NANO RILEY, go to https://civileats.com/2019/02/...w-laws-protect-them/]
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