Inside the world of the Fair Food Program, workers have the power and the tools to be the frontline monitors of their own rights, without fear of retaliation. Outside the Program, farmworkers are subjected to a litany of human rights abuses, including sexual harassment and abuse, wage theft, and even modern-day slavery.
“You’re not in Florida anymore… When we’re up here, what I say goes, not the CIW!”
Those were the words of a crewleader speaking to his crew on a farm in Georgia during the early years of the Fair Food Program, before the FFP had expanded to additional states and crops. Workers used the Fair Food Program’s hotline to report their crewleader’s thinly-veiled threat, but at that time the crewleader was right—there was nothing we could do to reassure the workers because the FFP’s groundbreaking protections didn’t extend to Georgia’s fields… yet.
However, thanks to the CIW’s national expansion, workers on that farm in Georgia are now empowered by the FFP, including its heat stress protocols, which mandate the provision of drinking water, electrolytes and rest breaks along with protections against wage theft, sexual harassment at the hands of crewleaders, and retaliation. For any issue they may face, farmworkers on this GA farm and all other FFP farms can contact the program’s 24/7, free and confidential hotline operated by highly trained human rights investigators.
Workers often bear witness to the unique power of the Fair Food Program, and the stories they tell only underscore the urgent need to bring the Program to every corner of the country.
In fact, after an education session at a Fair Food Program farm, an H2-A worker (a guest worker on a temporary visa) said that he wanted to speak to someone from the FFSC in order to see if anything could be done about the conditions at a non-Fair Food Program company where he had completed an H2-A contract the previous season. At this non-FFP farm, he said that there were no protections for the workers there. In addition to housing that was infested with roaches and rats, workers had to labor on in the rain, even with the danger of lightning, and without breaks. He acknowledged that there was a “great difference” between farms in the Fair Food Program and farms outside of the Program and wanted to know if anything could be done to improve conditions at that farm.
The hope of the Fair Food Program is that it eventually expands to cover all farmworkers across the U.S. and beyond. We’ve proven that we can expand the Program, and quickly. The Fair Food Program is now present in 19 states, and ten of those states were added in 2024 alone. But there are still far, far more farmworkers who toil beyond the reach of the program’s powerful protections than those who harvest our food in an environment of dignity and respect. Indeed, the CIW continuously uncovers and helps to prosecute modern-day slavery cases outside the reaches of the FFP, including the recent case US v. Moreno, which came to light after two workers jumped over a barbed wire-laden fence, hid in the trunk of a car, and called the CIW for help against the rampant abuse and threats they were receiving.
To reach those workers who still desperately need the FFP’s help, we need your support.
By giving monthly, you can give at an amount that is sustainable both for you and for the expansion of our work. Your support will help fuel the expansion of the Program to additional states and crops and support our ambitious, overarching aim: to guarantee that U.S. agriculture, which for centuries has relied on the exploitation of farmworkers, can finally enter a new day of human rights. Together, we can ensure there is only one reality of agriculture—one that protects the dignity of farmworkers through the Fair Food Program.
