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The Nation: Why Are Children Working in American Tobacco Fields?

December 14, 2015 by Peter Eversoll

Great reporting from The Nation on young farmworkers:

Young farm workers are falling ill from “green tobacco sickness” while the industry denies it and government lets it happen.

The air was heavy and humid on the morning the three Cuello sisters joined their mother in the tobacco fields. The girls were dressed in jeans and long-sleeve shirts, carried burritos wrapped in aluminum foil, and had no idea what they were getting themselves into. “It was our first real job,” says Neftali, the youngest. She was 12 at the time. The middle sister, Kimberly, was 13. Yesenia was 14.

Their mother wasn’t happy for the company. After growing up in Mexico, she hadn’t crossed the border so that her kids could become farmworkers. But the girls knew their mom was struggling. She had left her husband and was supporting the family on the minimum wage. If her girls worked in the tobacco fields, it would quadruple the family’s summer earnings. “My mom tends to everybody,” Neftali says. This was a chance to repay that debt.

Filed Under: News

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RECAP: The Give Food A Face Gala 2021

Watch the recap of the 2021 Give Food A Face virtual gala here!  

Lo que necesita saber sobre la vacuna COVID-19

El Episcopal Farmworker Ministry creó estos videos para responder sus preguntas sobre la vacuna COVID-19. Miran estos: Como es el proceso de la vacuna: Inmigrantes de Carolina del Norte comparten sus experiencias con la vacunación contra el COVID 19. Y tú, ¿ya te vacunaste? Por que vacunarse? Mensaje para la comunidad:

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