Mexican Laborers Want Americans to Know Who Picks Their Fruits and Vegetables Amparo Rodriguez - VICE News
go to original September 7, 2015

VICE News travels to northern Mexico and heads into the fields with the laborers to see their working conditions, then meets the organizer leading the fight in the Baja town of San Quintín for better pay and conditions. (VICE News)

On March 17, 2015, hundreds of fed up Mexican day laborers in the Baja California city of San Quintin began a series of demonstrations to protest their awful working conditions. It was a milestone, and a moment that drew international attention to the decades of exploitation they have endured.

Their demands were clear: Better wages, social benefits, and an end to sexual harassment by patrons against the wives of laborers. As San Quintin labor leader Fidel Sanchez noted, all of those things are already supposed to be enshrined in Mexico's constitution.

The San Quintin Valley is located in the southern end of the Baja Peninsula, sprawling over an area of approximately 80 miles. Despite dry weather, the valley is ideal for farming high quality fruits and vegetables, most of which are exported to the US.

More than 90,000 indigenous people have settled in the valley in recent decades, according to El Colegio de la Frontera Norte, a research institute that specializes in border issues. These people, including children, are the cheap labor force that works in San Quintin's fields.

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