Slave in the Fields: A Reporter Goes Undercover in the San Quintin Valley
Slave in the Fields: A Reporter Goes Undercover in the San Quintin Valley
Saturday, 25 July 2015 00:00
By Kau Sirenio Pioquinto, CIP Americas Program | Op-Ed
El Vergel, four in the morning. Everything is dark, cold. Men and women dressed in jackets against the chill form in two lines, waiting their turn to enter the bathroom. Even from afar, the smell of excrement penetrates the morning air. Meanwhile, at the sinks others splash cold water in their faces to banish the sleepiness that still lingers in the pre-dawn hours. They all get ready to prepare the mid-morning snack, lunch and dinners that they’ll take with them as they head out to harvest cucumbers and tomatoes.
In the central square of El Vergel, a few meters from the main entrance, a line of yellow trucks forms, all of them battered, with broken and dusty seats. They run their engines in anticipation of the teens, women and men who will soon board for the work day. A half hour was enough to fill 50 buses with indigenous workers from Oaxaca, Chiapas, Veracruz and Guerrero.
Guards inspect everyone who enters El Vergel before passing through the gatehouse at the main entrance in the morning. They’re making sure that an intruder doesn’’t sneak in, or worse, someone with political propaganda against the company, Los Pinos. Rancho Los Pinos or its registered name Northwest Industrial Production (the name varies, according to the workers’ movements) has received several of the nation’s presidents as an example of the kind of investment Mexico needed. In August 1999, Ernesto Zedillo came to inaugurate a cluster of housing for workers and a vegetable packing plant.
In March 2009, while visiting Baja California, Felipe Calderon landed on the airstrip of Rancho Los Pinos to join the Rodriguez brothers at a family party. And in November 2013 Enrique Peña Nieto delivered the National Export Award to the Rodriguez brothers for their accomplishments at San Quintin.
More:
http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/32013-slave-in-the-fields-a-reporter-goes-undercover-in-the-san-quintin-valley
