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NEA MANOLADA, Greece: Nea Manolada was a quiet village in southern
Greece unknown to many until a strike by “strawberry slaves”
exposed the dark underbelly of one of the country’s key economic
sectors.
His face burnt by the sun, 34-year-old Ivan
looked around nervously as he recounted how hundreds of migrant
fruit pickers stood up to their employers last month—and won,
briefly.
“Strawberries are particularly difficult to
pick,” said the burly Bulgarian who declined to give his real name
told Agence France-Presse.
“You’re squatting down for seven hours, with
a break that can be as little as 15 minutes. But the worst thing
under those plastic tarpaulins is the heat.”
He measures his words. Ivan, in Greece for a
decade, only became legal last year after Bulgaria joined the
European Union (EU), but he is mindful of the lot of many migrant
pickers—illegal, desperate for work but subject to exploitation
that has long met with an official blind eye.
“It’s the definition of modern slavery,”
said Ilias Ahmed, a member of the communist-affiliated Workers
Militant Front (PAME) who has helped create a union for Bangladeshi
workers in Greece.
The problem is not confined to the strawberry
farms on the west coast of the Peloponnese, where farmers are
dependent on seasonal laborers, many from abroad. When the
strawberry season ends in July, the workers go elsewhere to harvest
potatoes, olives, watermelons and more.
But for three days in late April, hundreds of
pickers in Nea Manolada staged an improbable strike to demand higher
pay.
Greek media found out and reports on the
“strawberry slaves” and the “strawberries of shame” brought
inspectors to conduct raids in this farmland corner.
They found entire families from Albania,
Bangladesh, Bulgaria, Romania and Greece’s minority Roma community
working in local greenhouses in temperatures up to 40 degrees
Celsius (104 degrees Fahrenheit).
More than 2,000 seasonal workers are employed in
Nea Manolada, a community of only 1,900 which a few years ago hit
upon strawberries as a lucrative crop now heavily exported to EU
partners.
This phenomenon shames our country’
Most of the migrants were living in squalor
inside makeshift huts made from the same plastic as the
greenhouses—and forced to pay a monthly rent of 60 euros to 100
euros ($93 to $156) to their employers for the privilege.
The farmers also own the onsite markets where
migrants buy weekly essentials, which returns even more of their
salaries straight back to employers.
“The workers of Nea Manolada are almost all
without papers. As such, they have no rights and the farmers can do
whatever they want,” said Ahmed.
Still, some say they’re grateful. “In
Bulgaria, my wife and daughter would have been prostitutes and I
would have been unemployed,” one Bulgarian migrant told the
Epsilon weekly.
Ahmed’s PAME group—part of the Greek
communist party KKE—got involved when farmers tried to quash the
strike, first with threats then hired muscle, according to KKE
members.
“We were saved by the workers who shielded us
from the farmers,” said Cosmas Alexiou, a KKE unionist and coroner
in nearby Pyrgos who was injured in the scuffles.
“I fell to the ground and tried to shield
myself from kicks and punches. A police squad car that was there did
nothing to interfere.”
The balking farmers—who said they would face
financial ruin—finally backed down at the prospect of produce
rotting. They conceded to raise daily salaries to 25 euros to 28
euros from 23 euros—still short of Greece’s legal minimum wage
of 30 euros for unskilled laborers.
“It’s no small gain,” said local PAME
supervisor Nikos Gontikas. “The strike enabled the workers to
begin organizing themselves.”
Local officials are torn. Mayor Antonis Seretis
of nearby Varda said strawberry production has important start-up
costs but conceded that the farmers could have handled things
better.
“They bear responsibility to a great extent
because they left salaries stagnant for two to three years, whilst
production increased,” he said.
An official at the Labor Inspection Bureau who
asked not to be named said numerous infractions had been found
around Greece, but dismissed union and migrants’ allegations that
exploitation was widespread in the agriculture sector.
“We have found cases around the country, but
we cannot speak of a mass phenomenon,” the official said.
Labor Minister Fanny Palli-Petralia, meanwhile,
has vowed action.
“This phenomenon shames our country,” she
told the Eleftheros Typos daily. “Wherever there are confirmed
cases of exploitation of human need, businesses will be locked up
and those responsible will go to jail.”
But after tempers cooled in Nea Manolada, the
farmers moved first, reportedly kicking out presumed strike
ringleaders to avoid further trouble.
“When I went to work [the following day] I was
told that I needn’t bother to come back,” said Ivan. “The same
treatment was extended to my family and friends, 15 of us were
thrown out in total.” migrants’ plight.
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