Status: 02/23/2023 06:00 a.m
Despite the supply chain law: Landing in German supermarkets rbb-Research continues Spanish organic tomatoes that are produced by migrants under inhumane conditions.
Said (name changed) on the huge greenhouse where he harvested tomatoes until recently. 40 hours a week, at the statutory minimum wage of 7.67 euros per hour, at least that’s what his employment contract says. But the reality is different: “We work more. Up to 70 hours a week. But only 40 hours are paid, from Monday to Friday. Saturdays and Sundays and overtime are not billed,” says Said.
The hourly wage drops to just under four euros. But when Said insisted on fair payment, the boss fired him immediately. Not the only problem at the vegetable producer Bio Cemosa, for which Said worked. He also experienced how pesticides were applied without any protective clothing. After that, the workers couldn’t even wash because there were no washrooms or toilets.
The worker Said in front of the greenhouses of the producer Bio Cemosa.
Image: Jan Wiese
Bio Cemosa is at the beginning of a supply chain that ends in the branches of Rewe, Lidl and Edeka in Germany. An inconspicuous number on the packaging of the tomatoes identifies them as certified goods and stands for “good and social agricultural practice”. Thanks to this number, the chain can be traced back – from the vegetable counter to the southern Spanish cooperative Biosabor and its member Bio Cemosa.
“A system of fear” in Europe’s vegetable garden
The southern Spanish region of Almería is considered the vegetable garden of Europe. Huge greenhouse plantations cover an area the size of 45,000 soccer fields. With 30 percent of all exports, Germany is the main buyer in the region: tomatoes worth around 200 million euros go to German supermarkets every year.
The trade unionist José García Cuevas speaks of a “system of fear” in the factories.
Image: Jan Wiese
But apparently very little of this money reaches the tens of thousands of mostly North African harvest workers. José García Cuevas from the regional union SOC-SAT takes care of many of them. The embezzlement of wages is omnipresent, he says, as is the disregard for health protection.
“In addition, there is a system of fear,” says the trade unionist. “Employers systematically intimidate their employees. Anyone who demands their rights will be fired immediately.” This system works better the less rights the workers have. In 2022, labor inspectors from the regional government discovered harvest workers working without a contract in every third inspection.
Harvesters live in slums
A direct consequence of these working conditions: around 5,000 people live in slums. In huts they build out of wooden pallets, stones and sticks, covered with used plastic sheeting from greenhouses. There is no running water, the electricity is tapped from the nearest power line. “You’re scared of fire, you’re scared when the rain comes, you’re scared of summer because it’s going to be so hot. All life here scares you“, tells Youssef, who has lived like this for four years. He also works in the greenhouses and harvests tomatoes. The salary is too low to be able to afford an apartment.
The workers’ quarters in Almería are simple huts, poorly constructed of stones, sticks and wooden pallets, covered with old plastic sheeting.
Image: Jan Wiese
The exploitation of harvest workers and their inhumane housing are not the only problems in Almería. About a third of the plastic sheeting that covers the greenhouses has to be replaced every year: an area of 10,000 hectares, says Marcos Diéguez of the Spanish environmental protection organization Ecologistas en Acción. His organization has compared the amounts of newly purchased greenhouse plastic sheeting with data from waste disposal companies. Only 35 percent of the films are then properly disposed of. A significant portion of the remainder ends up in one of more than 300 known illegal dumps. The damage to the environment and people is enormous, says Diéguez:
The plastic breaks down with the sun and the microplastics are distributed everywhere. Wind and water carry it to the sea. It gets into the food chain, and sooner or later we eat that. To me, that’s worse than an oil spill.
Environmental activist Marcos Diéguez shows an illegal dump of greenhouse plastic.
Image: Jan Wiese
Supermarkets are clueless
Wage exploitation, disregard for occupational safety, massive environmental pollution: Rewe, Edeka and Lidl reject requests to talk about the conditions at their tomato suppliers. They answer in writing: Such “conditions are not known,” says Edeka. Lidl and Rewe refer to “regular, independent on-site inspections” carried out according to the “GlobalGAP certification suitable for agriculture“. Such a certification certifies that the supermarket chains comply with “environmental and social standards“ at their vegetable producers.
“That is an answer that can no longer be given with the supply chain law“, judges Miriam Saage-Maass, chief legal officer at the human rights organization ECCHR. In their view, the conditions in Almería violate the new supply chain law that has been in force since January. This is to ensure that the suppliers of the large German companies comply with human rights and environmental standards. In addition, companies are obliged to carry out their own risk analyses. “And simply saying, ‘I have a certificate here, and that’s enough’ – that can’t be the answer,” says Saage-Maass in an interview rbb24 research.
insufficient self-control
The GlobalGAP certification mentioned by the supermarket chains is a system they created themselves in the 1990s. It is managed by an advisory board that also includes representatives from Lidl, Rewe and Edeka as well as various international agricultural organizations. In essence, it is a kind of self-regulation that is intended to ensure that minimum standards in production and working conditions in the agricultural sector are observed.
But the system is incomplete, explains Steffen Vogel from the development organization Oxfam: “We can see that the certification system as such doesn’t actually work.” He has been dealing with supply chains for years: “From our many years of experience and many studies, we see that the controls are either too incomplete or manipulated by the local companies, so that the certificates ultimately do not help to uncover human rights violations, but sometimes even help to cover them up.”
Such concealment should no longer be possible under the new supply chain law. 57 officials from the Federal Office of Economics and Export Control (BAFA) in Borna, Saxony, monitor its implementation in the supermarket chains. “When companies have achieved such certification, it can be a sign that they comply with the requirements of the law. It is not proof, however,” Torsten Safarik, head of the authority, clarifies. But he also doesn’t want to burden the companies too much, he says, so that they don’t “suffer from disadvantages on the world markets”. However, Safarik expects companies to make greater efforts in the future to ensure that their suppliers respect human and occupational safety rights more closely.
Oxfam demands higher consumer prices
According to Vogel, the Oxfam employee, the supermarket chains have very easy leverage to improve the conditions at their tomato producers in Almería: “The supermarkets have to pay higher prices for the products they buy. And they also have to track that this money is actually arrives locally, so that it is invested in higher wages and better standards.”
That would certainly help Said and Youssef and the thousands of harvest workers in Almería. The Spanish companies, at the request of the rbb not answered.