TODAY — Monday, Sept. 28, _2:15__ p.m. EST (11:00 am PST) tele-news conference
Farm workers win long-fought battle for pesticide worker protections under new EPA rules
UFW President Arturo Rodriguez Joins U.S. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy & Labor Secretary Thomas Perez for Teleconference
Washington, D.C.—Today, farm workers across the nation will celebrate a big victory as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency announces protections against unsafe pesticide use for farm workers nationwide. Today’s action by the Obama administration ends decades of exclusion for farm workers from pesticide rules that have safeguarded other U.S. workers. The announcement coincides with the 50th anniversary of California farm workers joining together to fight for basic labor protections.
“We have worked with President Obama, EPA Administrator McCarthy, Secretary Perez and others in the administration to end decades-long discriminatory labor practices against farm workers. The same rules that have protected other American workers from dangerous cancer- and birth-defect causing pesticides are finally going to protect farm workers under the new EPA regulations. Our families and communities will now be able to work with reassurance that the work they are doing will not unknowingly harm themselves or their families. It’s been a long time coming, but it has come today,” said United Farm Workers President Arturo Rodriguez.
The new EPA pesticide rules being announced today include:
- Requiring all pesticide applicators be at least 18 years old
- Creating whistleblower protections so farm workers can confidentially submit complaints over pesticide abuses
- Providing pesticide application records for all farm workers for the past two years
- Easy access to all workers or their representatives for records involving exposure to hazardous chemicals
- Posting pesticide hazard information in central locations, in both English and Spanish
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that 10,000 to 20,000 physician-diagnosed pesticide poisonings occur each year among the approximately 2 million U.S. agricultural workers. Many of these protections are already afforded to farm workers under UFW contracts with growers and union-supported laws in the states of California and Washington state. With today’s announcement, these protections will now extend to farm workers working in fields across the country.
Who: United Farm Workers President Arturo Rodriguez, U.S. EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy and U.S. Labor Secretary Thomas Perez
What: Announcing first-ever nationwide pesticide protections for farm workers
When: 2:15 EST (11:15 am PST), Monday, Sept. 28, 2015.
*** FOR CREDENTIALED NEWS MEDIA ONLY***
Remarks by Arturo S. Rodriguez, President
United Farm Workers of America
Telephone news conference announcing
new EPA pesticide rules for farm workers
September 28, 2015
It is a privilege to join Administrator McCarthy and Secretary Perez for this momentous announcement.
As President of the United Farm Workers and having spent my life fighting alongside farm workers in the field, I have seen up close the consequences of farm workers not being afforded key and essential workplace protections granted to other U.S. laborers
Past discriminatory practices forced farm workers to be excluded from major federal labor laws since the 1930s. Then, most farm workers in the Southern U.S. were African Americans. In California, they were mostly from Mexico and the Philippines—and Mexican Americans born in the U.S. such as Cesar Chavez and his family. We just celebrated this weekend the 50th anniversary of the brave women and men who walked out on strike in Delano when first forming the United Farm Workers—and today’s announcement is a dream come true.
Protecting both farm workers and consumers has been a hallmark of the United Farm Workers since the 1960s. The first time DDT and a few 2 other toxic pesticides were banned in the United States was not by the EPA in was via a UFW contract with a grape grower in 1967.
The UFW has continued negotiating union contracts with pesticide protections. Our founder Cesar Chavez asked, “What good does it do to achieve the blessings of collective bargaining and make economic progress for people when their health is destroyed in the process?”
The union exposed cancer clusters in the Central Valley during the ‘80s.
Cesar Chavez’s last—and longest—public fast, of 36 days, in 1988 was over the pesticide poisoning of farm workers and their children.
The UFW helped enact basic pesticide protections in California, Texas and Washington state during the ‘80s, ‘90s and early 2000s. They included posting in the fields, wait periods before re-entry and pesticide drift notifications near schools.
We have worked with President Obama, EPA Administrator McCarthy, Secretary Perez and others in the administration to end this discrimination against farm workers.
Here is what this means for farm workers now in all 50 of our United States: it will no longer permissible for children to apply pesticides – this new EPA rule requires all pesticide applicators to be at least 18 years old. Additionally, this measure enhances pesticide training requirements, enacts whistleblower protections and allows improved access to important health records.
So, today, we can say that most of the same rules that have protected other American workers from dangerous cancer- and birth-defect causing pesticides are finally going to protect farm workers under the new EPA regulations.
Is it ever too late to do the right thing? It’s been a long time coming, but it has come today.