The article “Migrant Farm Workers: Our Nation’s Invisible Population” was written by Eduardo Gonzalez and it relates to our topic of migrant farming; it discusses the importance of immigrants and their overall effect on the food industry. A majority of immigrants are working to support their families by sending money to them back in their home country. Therefore, these workers are desperate to provide. This usually means that they are the ones getting down and doing the hard, dirty labor. As it says in this article, they have “a strong work ethic, deeply rooted in their commitment to provide for their families or make it on their own”. The main reason they come to the United States to work is to avoid political unrest and to help guarantee a better future for their children. Therefore, these workers are considered the “invisible population” because they are undocumented and fly under the radar. However, they are the major part of the labor work on farms.
The article talks about how these immigrants are important because they will work “jobs no longer attractive to US citizens due to low pay, limited or no benefits and/or substandard work conditions”. As it was noted in the video “Food, Inc.”, undocumented immigrants are doing the tough part of gathering chickens in the middle of the night because these workers would not be able to say anything about the circumstances. Also, as it was said in Tracie McMillan’s “The American Way of Eating”, immigrants have to work in gruel situations and cannot complain because a majority of them would risk deportation. If immigrants do complain about wages, then the company could replace them with machinery. Gonzalez confirms McMillan’s writings by saying that “out of fear of displacement and deportation, farm workers often remain unable to protest inadequate conditions or report employer’s violation of labor, health or safety laws to state authorities”. There migrant farm workers are working the jobs that Americans don’t want to work. They are, technically, the backbone of the farmers industry because they work long hours for barely any pay to provide the fruits and vegetables; the same fruits and vegetables that feed the average American family. |