Scorching Existence
Existence is a privilege. Yet, what happens when that very existence is scorched from the beginning? This is the daily reality of uncounted migrant farmworkers and their families. Many are born into the farm labor that their parents have done and have little control over it themselves. Agricultural work is extremely challenging, and at the same time unrewarded: low pay, limited access to education, poor living conditions, inadequate health care, exposure to chemicals and dangerous work conditions. And now, increasingly, weather that even a generation ago would have seemed barely tolerable is becoming common as farmworkers are exposed to hotter temperatures, higher heat indexes, and downwind smoke from fires. The epigraph above is a warning that scorching existence might have been experienced first by laborers, but everyone lives on the same planet. Harmful conditions that the Geneseo Migrant Center (GMC) worked to mitigate still remain, or have become even more hazardous; it is evident that a change for the better in lives of migrant farm workers benefits everyone.
This image demonstrates just how much work goes into generating even "simple" food items like potatoes. The migrant farmworkers are seen on their knees handpicking the potatoes and placing them in a bucket. It is crucial to note that migrant farmworkers get paid by how many potatoes they pick that day and not hourly. Insufficient income means limited access to necessities such as nutritious food, safe housing, healthcare, and education for their children, trapping them in generational poverty and farming.
Yet, for the world to be economically steady, farms are essential so that humans can receive food. According to the National Library of Medicine , “These farmworkers provide the hand labor needed to plant, cultivate, and harvest many of the state’s economically important crops, including tobacco, cucumbers, sweet potatoes, berries, peaches, apples, and Christmas trees. Immigrant farmworkers are also increasingly full-time employees, supporting the production of livestock and poultry, as well as crops”. Without the hard work of the migrant farm workers, it seems that there would only be half the food supply there is today. Nevertheless, when people are considering the origin of their food, they often overlook the migrant farmers who worked to produce it. Every day, thousands of hardworking migrant farmers are subjected to unsafe working conditions that seem to go unnoticed. Since 2020, we’ve even learned a new way to describe these necessary, but invisible people: essential workers.
As the Covid-19 pandemic drastically struck the entire world, everyone was told to stay inside as much as possible and isolate themselves to prevent the virus from spreading. The only people who went to work during this time were the individuals categorized as essential workers. This included healthcare workers, mechanics, grocery stores, and migrant farm workers. Even so, the one significant difference between all of the other essential workers and the migrant farm workers was the mandates they needed to follow. The mandates for essential workers included wearing masks, maintaining a six-foot distance from others, and getting vaccinated once available. Unfortunately, the migrant farm workers were not given these mandates and were forced to work the same way as they were before the virus.
Green Empire Farms located in Oneida, New York, is a massive hydroponic farm that opened in August 2019 and employed over 300 migrant farmworkers. Yet, from April to June 2020, 179 out of those 300 workers contracted the Covid-19 virus. While fortunately, no one died during this time, it does not forgive the circumstances that migrant farmworkers were put in to have gotten the virus in the first place. Migrant Green Empire Farms farmworker, Viane Mbabajende, who was one of the people who received the virus in June of 2020 states, “I got it at work…There was no place to stay six feet. We were very many.” After it was observed that the migrant farmers were getting infected with the virus, they were relocated to a Super 8 hotel in Oneida, NY. Sadly, this led the migrant farm workers to a further dangerous situation.
Since migrant farm workers are constantly put in agonizing circumstances that leave them exhausted at the end of the day, they never have any time to have any hobbies or explore what they like. While most people can find what they would like to pursue in the future or what activities they enjoy as they are growing up, migrant farm workers do not have that benefit. To help support their family, most migrant children leave school at eight years old to work on the farm with their parents. Thus, these situations cause numerous migrant workers to be illiterate and unable to discover what they enjoy in life.
Yet, when the right people come together at the right time, this can change the lives of many migrant farm workers. All it took was a flight to Rochester in 1967 with people passionate about changing the lives of migrant workers, which led to the creation of the Geneseo Migrant Center.
The Geneseo Migrant Center, located in Mt. Morris, New York, was established to provide a range of services to migrant workers. Over the years, this center has given these hardworking individuals an opportunity they never thought they would have. It offered them a chance to take a break, learn new skills, express themselves, access healthcare when necessary, and much more. Initially, it was primarily a place for migrant farmworkers' children to receive care while their parents were occupied. Yet, when the parents saw how much their children enjoyed it, they also became interested. As a result, it transformed into a place where both parents and children could seek assistance and find a means of self-expression. Not only did it allow the farmers to convey their emotions, but it also allowed them to convey what life as a migrant farmer was truly like
The Geneseo Migrant Center was such a large opportunity for the migrant workers because it is probable without it, that they would have never been able to experience their full potential. It is difficult to say there would have been as much assistance or activism to the migrant workers. The Geneseo Migrant Center put out a slight amount of the flame that the migrant farmers have been scorched with their entire lives.
The images above show just how much physical labor went into producing even "simple" food items like potatoes. As one collectively written poem explained, "You can stand on your bag, / Crawl on your knees, / Or--you know-- / Just sit down and slide." Workers were paid by how many bags of potatoes they picked that day, not an hourly wage, amounting to thousands of pounds lifted. Insufficient income meant--and still means--limited access to necessities such as nutritious food, safe housing, healthcare, and education for their children, trapping them in generational poverty and few options besides farming.
During the half century since these photographs were taken, little has changed: for the world to function, farms are essential so that all humans can receive food. As two professors of public health summarize, farmworkers "provide the hand labor needed to plant, cultivate, and harvest" many of the most economically important crops, and immigrants "are also increasingly full-time employees, supporting the production of livestock and poultry, as well as crops." Without the hard work of migrant labor, it seems impossible to envision how it could be produced. Nevertheless, when people are considering the origin of their food, they usually overlook the migrant farmers who worked to produce it.