"What about the health of agricultural workers?", 20 Jan 2023

... “We suffer from health problems related to working in agriculture: back pain, neck injuries, lumbago, musculoskeletal conditions, and, because of our exposure to agrochemicals, headaches, stomach problems and allergies,” says Ana Pinto, from the Jornaleras de Huelva en Lucha (JHL), a collective defending the rights of the women employed as seasonal labour to pick strawberries and red fruit in the Andalusian province of Huelva, in Spain. According to Pinto, not only is it “very hard to have these types of ailments recognised as occupational illnesses”, but agricultural workers also have difficulty accessing sick leave.

The situation is even more critical when the people employed are migrants. Those whose administrative status is irregular are unlikely to have access to the health system, let alone any kind of employee benefits ...

These workers pay social security contributions, but when they need assistance, their access to health and labour rights is obstructed ...

The situation is similar in other parts of Europe where farming is intensive, such as the south of France and southern Italy. Many workers from countries such as Ecuador, Colombia or Morocco, with legal residence in Spain, have gone to work in Provence, France, through temporary employment agencies (ETTs) based in Spain. This hiring system has prospered because it is very advantageous for French agricultural companies: the workers continue to pay social security in Spain, where the contributions are lower ... workers employed through this system find it very difficult to access the health system – as well as to exercise their labour rights – when they have an accident at work or a health problem ...