Summary – Rosarno Observatory

X Report by Medici per i Diritti Umani on the living and working conditions of foreign farm labourers in the Gioia Tauro Plain

For the tenth consecutive year, Medici per i Diritti Umani (MEDU) operated in the Gioia Tauro Plain in the framework of the project “Open Fields: laboratory of territorial practices to promote dignity of life and work”. Relying on a wide network of organisations – with the Regional Intervention Centre for Cooperation (CRIC) as the responsible body and MEDU, ARCI, the FCEI’s Mediterranean Hope project, the CSC Nuvola Rossa, the University of Calabria (Dispes – Unical), and the Network “ Comuni Solidali” (RECOSOL) as partners – the project aims to strengthen the processes of emancipation from labour exploitation and social isolation of foreign agricultural workers in the territory of the Metropolitan City of Reggio Calabria.

During the first two months of activity (April-May 2023), the mobile clinic team operated at the main precarious settlements where agricultural seasonal labourers live, providing primary medical assistance and socio-legal guidance.

Compared to previous years, there was a drastic decrease in the number of immigrants, partly due to the timing of the intervention, which began only at the end of the citrus harvesting season, and partly due to other factors such as the long waiting times for the issuance or renewal of residence permits at the Police Headquarters in Reggio Calabria and the Gioia Tauro and adverse weather factors that led to a sharp drop in citrus production and a reduction in the harvest. At the end of the 2023 citrus harvesting season, no more than 500 workers were present in the informal settlements of the Plain.

In two months, the mobile clinic team assisted a total of 94 people between medical examinations and legal assistance, conducting 80 medical examinations and 63 legal interviews.

The population is made up of young men with an average age of 35, from sub-Saharan West African countries and present in Italy for more than 3 years (88%). 92% of the people assisted were regular residents compared to 8% of irregular.

Only 15% had a residence permit for work, while most workers had a residence permit as asylum seekers (39%), for subsidiary protection (22%) and special protection (22%). One per cent were refugees and a further one per cent had a residence permit for awaiting employment.

The policies and measures adopted in recent months by the new executive power – in particular the so-called “Cutro Decree” – have contributed to a growing precarization of the legal conditions of migrants, asylum seekers and refugees as they set increasingly restrictive criteria for obtaining and renewing certain types of residence permit.

As for housing conditions, although in recent years there have been many declarations of intent and institutional initiatives aimed at “overcoming informal settlements” – including national and European funding, Action Plans, Memoranda of Understanding, Programmatic tables – yet another citrus harvesting season ended without any concrete improvement of housing and living conditions of foreign agricultural workers. The most recent innovations concern the realization of the “Social Village”, in Contrada Russo (Municipality of Taurianova), financed by the Calabria Region through the Refugee Integration Fund (FAMI) emergency of the European Commission and the “Village of Solidarity”Rosarno, in an asset confiscated from the Mafia. To date, however, although the renovation works have been completed, both structures remain closed. In January 2022, the “Dambe So” hostel opened on the initiative of the Mediterranean Hope project of the Federation of Evangelical Churches in Italy (FCEI).

As for working conditions, despite daily wages have improved slightly (between € 45 and € 50 for 8 hours of work on average), wage and contribution irregularities remain extremely widespread: undeclared or irregular work remain the norm.

Regarding access to care, only 43% of the interviewees had a valid health card. Factors such as the complexity of bureaucratic procedures, language barriers in the absence of cultural mediators, structural deficiencies of services due to limited economic and personnel resources, the isolation of the informal settlements, the absence of public transport, and widespread poverty which prevent many labourers from contributing, when required, to health care costs, hinder effective access to care.

 The problems of the regional health system, already significant in past years, remain serious, with Calabria confirming its position as the least efficient region in Italy in 2022. The general epidemiological picture confirms the close correlation between the health conditions and the hygienic, working and housing conditions of the Plain’s labour population: social marginalisation, extremely precarious housing and hygienic conditions, lack of drinking water and heating, inhuman working conditions, poor or insufficient nutrition, and obstacles to access to fundamental rights. With regard to the pathologies found, prevalence of pathologies of the osteo-articular system (22% of cases) is confirmed, followed by pathologies of the digestive system (12% of patients) due not only to precarious living conditions and the impossibility of cooking in a clean environment, but also to the consumption of rainwater or stagnated water in the workplace.

In view of the picture described, MEDU once again calls for decisive institutional intervention and makes a number of recommendations to this end.