Exploited labourers in some southern Italian regions work for many hours, have no rights and are often cheated out of their wages. Many are also victims of severe violence. They are referred to as modern slaves who harvest food that often ends up on Norwegian tables.
Organised crime networks in North Africa and Italy - including the Mafia - collaborate to smuggle people into Italy to obtain cheap labour for agriculture. Africans pay thousands of Euro. Growers give them a written guarantee of work, so they get temporary work permits. The migrants come legally to Italy, but the jobs do not exist.
They cannot speak the language, have countless debts and no job or place to stay. Contacts smuggle hundreds of migrant workers and control all aspects of the workers' lives.
The case of Alí Agrebi
Agrebi was promised a job in a flower shop with a monthly salary of 1,200 Euro and a nice apartment, but the timid and short-statured 32-year-old begins to sense uneasiness when his contact takes him to a dilapidated shack without electricity, water or toilet. The roof is covered with asbestos and he must sleep on the floor with 40 other Africans.
- "This was not what we agreed," complaints Agrebi.
That evening, Hassen (the contact) gets a call from the grower Giuseppe.
- "I need 50 pickers. Can you help me?"
- "No problem, I have a new batch of Tunisians."
The next day, Agrebi and the other Africans must harvest aubergines, peppers and cherry tomatoes. They work from five in the morning until seven at night, seven days a week with no salary.
- "I have to spend money to arrange the paperwork, the food you eat and the place you sleep. You owe me lots of money. Until the debt is paid, you are mine."
From Sicily to Puglia
Agrebi managed to escape and a few weeks later he was begging in the streets of Puglia. He slept under the olive trees with a few cardboard boxes around him. He was found by another contact.
- "I realise that you need a job. I can help you."
Agrebi was taken to a dilapidated house, with several hundred Africans sleeping on the floor and no electricity, running water or toilet.
- "You will work in the tomato harvest. You are free to travel, but you cannot work here without me as a mediator, said the contact before collecting every passport.
The pay is of 20 to 25 Euro a day. They are deducted five Euro a day for accommodation and five Euro for their transport to the tomato fields, as well as additional money for food and water. Agrebi had no choice. He must raise money to pay his family debts.
Once the labourers are unable to continue working after being underfed and even mistreated, they are simply replaced by new ones.
Old system
This trafficking system in the agricultural sector is over 100 years old. When a grower needs to harvest the crops, he goes to a contact, who provides the labourers. All wages are paid to that person.
"Those contacts can earn 75,000 dollars a month, and even more," says anthropologist Sarah Curci.
Their use has been banned, but according to a major research report published last week, this practice has increased dramatically in recent years.
"In the past, the use of such contacts was limited to agriculture in southern Italy; now it has spread to other parts of the country, also to the more developed agricultural areas in northern Italy," assures Placido Rizzotto, author of the report, which also counted with the contribution of some of Italy's top anti-Mafia prosecutors.
The use of facilitators in agriculture has spread to 18 of Italy's 20 regions. 400,000 workers are exploited by traffickers, while a quarter work and live in "slave-like conditions."
Consequences
Agrebi went to the police, which resulted in 22 facilitators and growers being charged with slavery enforcement, human trafficking and exploitation. The maximum penalty is 30 years imprisonment. It is the first time that such a case is brought to trial in Italy.
Agrebi's family still has huge debts, but nevertheless, he is glad that he went to the police.
- "I have kept my pride. I can walk with my head held high."
