Drive around table grape vineyards across Kern and Tulare counties. You’ll see workers packing grapes standing at tables equipped with umbrellas to protect them from the sun. Not Giumarra Vineyards Corp.–the only major company that forces
Grape workers demand Giumarras halt
crippling and discriminatory practices
Drive around table grape vineyards across Kern and Tulare counties during the summer harvest season. You’ll see workers packing grapes standing at tables equipped with umbrellas to protect them from the sun. Most growers have long supplied the tables and umbrellas as well as wheelbarrows so pickers don’t have to lug grape boxes heavy with fruit from deep inside the vineyards to the packing tables.
Not Giumarra Vineyards Corp., America’s largest table grape grower. President John Giumarra and his family are the only major company that forces packers to labor 10 hours a day or more on their knees in the blistering sun without umbrellas. The Giumarras think it improves quality. It causes workers to suffer crippling knee injuries, arthritis and other ailments. Denying pickers wheelbarrows also produces needless pain and suffering.
More than a dozen Giumarra farm workers will gather outside the giant company’s Edison headquarters to demonstrate the crippling effects of these practices—such as making workers pack on their knees. Then they will use tables, umbrellas and wheelbarrows they bring to show the difference these measures make.
The workers will demand John Giumarra immediately halt practices that cripple his workers and join other valley grape growers by providing tables and umbrellas so packers can work on their feet as well as wheelbarrows for pickers.
Who: More than a dozen Giumarra table grape workers, UFW organizer Armando Elenes.
What: Demonstrating how the Giumarras use practices that cripple their workers.
When: 4:30 p.m., Tuesday, June 27, 2006.
Where: Outside Giumarra headquarters, 11220 Edison Hwy. (at Edison Rd. exit off Hwy. 58) in Edison.