Editorial: The real heroes behind harvest

California has long been North America’s fertile crescent, a place where the soil is rich and the sun often shines. But baked into America’s fruit bowl is a legacy of labor violations so brutal that strawberries start to look suspect.

Of the nearly 800,000 farmworkers who keep our state’s agricultural industry -- and our local wineries and vineyards -- operational, nearly 75% are undocumented, according to the Center for Farmworker Families. These workers live without many of the protections that guard those in physically demanding industries, falling into the cracks of a system that seems designed to exploit.

California became increasingly dependent on Mexican labor during World War I, after racist laws like the Chinese Exclusion Act and the Immigration Act of 1917 boxed out laborers from Asia and Europe. In 1917, California enacted its first Bracero program, which allowed people from Mexico to work here regardless of their citizenship status. While the program ended in 1921, it set in motion a trend that would be all but impossible to stop.

Within a decade, the bulk of California’s crops were picked by cheap, immigrant labor. The secretive nature of the industry allowed labor abuses to run wild -- from traffickers who stole workers’ pay to women raped in the fields, there is no shortage of human tragedy in agriculture. And yet despite generations of widespread evidence, very little has been done to right these wrongs.

Gov. Jerry Brown didn’t sign the Agricultural Labor Relations Act until 1975, giving California farmworkers the right to organize as laborers. Since then, those efforts have been hindered by years of undermining. While 80,000 farmworkers held union memberships in the 1970s, that number dwindled to about 5,500 in 2021, CalMatters reports.

“UC Merced estimated in 2021 that farmworker union membership had fallen to a statistical 0%. More recently the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported 3.9% union membership in agriculture and related industries,” the news source shared in March.

Faced with massive labor shortages during the pandemic, when many of these critical workers were unable to cross the border, the average hourly rate for farmworkers finally began to rise. And quickly, from $15 to $25+ an hour, as growers struggled to find people willing and able to pick grapes.

But still, vineyard workers can live packed with eight to 10 people in a two-bedroom apartment. Or in their cars, trying to save every penny to bring home.

We can no longer turn a blind eye to these disturbing realities of our major industry. It’s time to consider more aggressive solutions that provide humanity and dignity to all who support our Valley.

As the winegrape harvest kicks off this week, the Valley will begin to fill with those who enjoy the seasonal activities from the comfort of a tasting room. But as we plan our harvest parties and celebrate our bounty of the season, let’s not forget about the back-breaking labor our local industry requires. And the people who rise in the dark and spend hours under the hot sun doing the work most of us could not.

All for a glass of wine.