"Maximillian Alvarez: Like you said, so many consumers don’t know (or don’t want to know) what workers like yourself go through to get their produce to the supermarket, to restaurants, etc. Can you say a little more about your own experience as a farmworker and what that work entails on a day-to-day basis? Who are the people primarily doing this kind of work?
Lupe Gonzalo: They are migrant workers who come here to Immokalee from different countries, specifically from Guatemala, Mexico, Haiti, and several other countries. A normal day for us workers means waking up at 3:30 a.m. to begin your day and prepare some food to take to the fields. For me, as a mother, it meant getting my children ready at that early morning hour to take them to someone else, another woman. There is no school or daycare that opens before 8 a.m. Therefore, there are other people who take care of children. So, I would take them there and then go to work.
When you arrive at these farms, the only tool they give you is a bucket — a bucket that you have to fill with tomatoes. A bucket weighs about thirty-two pounds or more when it’s filled up to the brim. When they tell you to pile the fruit above the rim, though, it can weigh up to thirty pounds. We used to get paid fifty cents for each bucketful. We did not get paid by the hour, we were never guaranteed a minimum salary at the end of the week — we got paid for each bucketful that we harvested. So, in order to be able to make a decent income at the end of the week, one had to harvest between 100 and 150 buckets per day. But that always depends on the weather; it depends on how hot it is and also on the experience of the workers. Also, if you reported some abuse, or if you complained about the working conditions, the contractor would say, “Here’s the pay I’m offering, if you want it. Take it or leave it.”
"Farmworkers in Florida Are Protesting Modern-Day Slavery"
https://jacobin.com/2023/03/farmworkers-immokalee-florida-ciw-slavery-abuse
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