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The plate of exploitation and gender inequality

In the Philippines, despite putting in the same amount of work, women in sugar, coconut, and corn plantations receive lower pay than men.
In Uganda, women with an extremely low level of land ownership and political representation are often excluded in decision-making over what to do with the conversion of food farms into monocultures, such as palm oil plantations. Their ability to feed their families through farming is also compromised as a result of their lack of power to decide on the use of land.
Huelva’s migrant strawberry pickers, many of whom are undocumented and have to go unpaid for doing overtime, live in overcrowded makeshift shelters, without clean water and electricity, according to news reports.

Agricultural workers, including migrant workers, do not just suffer from health problems linked to the industrial production mode. Many of them are also victims of labor and human rights violations. They receive inadequate wages, endure having to live in unsanitary shacks, and work under slave-like or extremely dangerous conditions.

One example is the plight of Moroccans working in the strawberry plantations of Spain’s Huelva Province, which largely exports the fruit to Germany, the UK, and France.

Often suffering from work and living conditions much worse than that of males are their female counterparts. This is because the dominant food system replicates and even exacerbates gender inequalities that are rooted in patriarchy. This system is based on the unequal distribution of power between men and women to the detriment of the latter, as women often engage in unpaid care and domestic work.

What is the real price of “cheap” industrially produced food and who pays for it? Do those affected by injustice and human rights violations have the possibility to participate in decision-making about their food systems?