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Action Alert!
Children in farming communities are on the front lines everyday because they live, play and learn near agricultural fields. Pesticides applied to these fields don’t stay put -- they drift, vaporize, land in homes and on schoolyards. Current regulations don’t account for this reality. This issue is exacerbated by the fact that farmworker and rural children typically live in poverty and without access to health care.
Click here to make a difference...
Farmworker Awareness Week
March 28 - April, 3 2010
http://saf-unite.org/action/faw.htm
Farmwoker Awarness Week is coming up. YOU can help by hosting an event in your campus, school, or community! Click here to find out more.
Action Alert!
Farmworkers in Florida Going Hungry!
We cannot stand by when a fundamental injustice is impacting farmworkers in our state! Farmworkers feed the world, but now they cannot even feed themselves. We know. We talk to them every day! You can help!
Click Here to Find Out How!!!
Four Courageous Students Embark on "The Trail of Dreams"
A Trek from Florida to D.C. Highlights Need to Pass the Dream Act
and Comprehensive Immigration Reform
The “Trail of Dreams” was conceived by four undocumented youth who wish to raise awareness and share their stories about what it is like to be an undocumented immigrant in this country. Living in what they feel are the shadows at the fringe of society, these young people are advocating for comprehensive immigration reform that would create a way for immigrants to attain a legitimate path to residency.
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We are all one family and our Haitian brothers and sisters are suffering and in great need! FWAF, with a history of responding to natural disasters affecting farmworkers in Florida, is now mobilizing support for those living in our island neighbor who have been devastated by the earthquake. There are many Haitian farmworkers in Florida and many of them have family in Haiti who they are are very concerned about.
Read More...
HIGHLIGHTS FROM 2009
* The Agricultural Justice Project merges organic production standards with social justice values to produce safe, pesticide-free fruits and vegetables produced with fair treatment of farmworkers. The project is a collaboration with the Florida Organic Growers Association and several other organizations to initiate a pilot program in the Southeast that partners organic growers, local retailers, and farmworker groups to apply standards for just working conditions for farmworkers on organic farms, and that provides a value-added niche market to help organic growers compete in the increasingly competitive marketplace. Based on the AJP project that developed over the past ten years in Minnesota, the Florida-based project will be a model for other collaborations around the country to promote an ethical domestic fair trade label for agricultural products that ensures that workers receive a living wage, safe working conditions, and fair treatment in the workplace.
* The Lake Apopka Farmworkers Memorial Quilt Project started because too many community members were going to funerals. The former Lake Apopka farmworkers are experiencing many chronic health problems and have watched as friends and family members have died prematurely. With each death, a loved one is lost and so is their personal story of life as a farmworker. Hence, the idea of a memorial quilt was born. Many farmworkers worked on the Lake Apopka vegetable farms long before laws were passed to protect them from pesticide exposure and at a time when some of the most dangerous pesticides were still legally used. The quilt will serve as a remembrance of those who have passed on, as well as an organizing tool to galvanize the community to continue to fight for better health and safety protections for farmworkers, and for recognition of the decades of sacrifice of these hard-working men and women. Evolving over the past year, the project is now well underway with a team of local African-American community leaders, humanities scholars, professional artists and student volunteers. An amazing work in progress, the quilt is so much more than a work of art. It will be accompanied by a short documentary that will be available on the internet for the world to see.
* FWAF launched the innovative Youth Empowerment Program in Apopka, Fellsmere, Pierson, Immokalee and Homestead. An HIV/AIDS education, awareness and prevention program for Haitian and Hispanic youth in at-risk and farmworker communities, the program uses the internet and social networking tools to keep the young people engaged and connected through interactive, relevant, continually evolving communications networks. With a three-year grant from the Florida Department of Health’s HIV/AIDS Bureau, YEP’s aim is to be a model program that can be replicated in other communities around the country, helping to educate and inform young people, and even helping to save lives. Just completing its first year, the program has already engaged over 72 young people in youth group sessions, a camping trip, and digital storytelling workshops which were not only fun, creative, and community-building, but also helped to raise the consciousness about disease risks and prevention. January ushers in the beginning of the second year of this already very successful project.
* Baby, I Love You is a newly launched program that provides healthy pregnancy and well-woman education to women of childbearing age in farmworker communities, funded by the Florida Department of Health’s Closing the Gap program. Outreach workers connect with at-risk farmworker women in all five satellite office areas of FWAF, helping women to become better informed, more self-confident, more knowledgeable, and better prepared for pregnancy and for a healthier life. Through this program, women are empowered to gain control over their own health by understanding the importance of good nutrition, preventive health care, managing stress, avoiding risky behaviors, home and car safety, addressing domestic violence and the availability of services and assistance in their community. The program started in July, and expects to reach 1000 farmworker and rural, low-income women in its first year.
* Pregnancy Health Among Florida Farmworkers is a research study that was launched late in 2009. A four-year community-based participatory research project in conjunction with Emory University, the aim of the project is to identify occupational risks to the pregnancy health of farmworker women working in nurseries and ferneries in Central Florida. One of the goals is to develop a manual and training specifically designed to educate farmworker women about how to protect themselves and their unborn children from pesticide exposure and other threats to their health from the hazards of the work environment. The project is especially significant as emerging scientific research reveals previously unknown threats of pesticides on fetal development. Project results will help farmworkers not just in Florida, but around the country as well. The research project is funded by the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health.
*The Latino Small Farmers Outreach Initiative is a new project initiated in October that will reach Latino limited-resource farmers in the areas of Homestead and Pierson. Funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, this project will provide important information to these farmers about Farm Service Agency programs and assistance they may be eligible for to improve and maintain their farms. Small farmers play a critical role in our food systems; however, it is often difficult for them to maintain their farm operations, especially following natural disasters. FWAF’s new outreach program will work with Latino small farmers to identify their needs, and connect them with useful resources.
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