Pope backs migrant farm workers as Italy mulls legalisation
Published:Wednesday | May 6, 2020 | 9:38 AM
ROME (AP) — Migrant farm workers must be treated with dignity, Pope Francis said Wednesday, issuing his appeal as Italy weighs whether to legalise the workers amid a shortage of seasonal farmhands due to the coronavirus crisis.
Farm lobby groups and some Italian lawmakers and ministers have warned that the spring and summer harvests are at risk because Italy’s usual seasonal workers, many of whom live in Eastern Europe, are stuck at home because of virus travel restrictions.
Francis said he had been struck by the impact of the COVID-19 crisis on migrant farm workers, who even before the pandemic lived hand-to-mouth with intermittent jobs that pay around 25 euro ($27) a day.
While migrants are not testing positive in great numbers, their precarious, off-the-books work has dried up because of Italy’s coronavirus lockdown.
“It is true that the current crisis affects everyone, but people’s dignity must always be respected. That is why I add my voice to the appeal of these workers and of all exploited workers,” Francis said at his weekly audience.
“May the crisis give us the opportunity to make the dignity of the person and of work the centre of our concern.”
Agriculture Minister Teresa Bellanova, of the centre-left Italia Viva party, has proposed giving temporary, six-month renewable residency permits to the migrants already in Italy who pick lemons, oranges and tomatoes but in wretched labour conditions.
The proposal would also require farm owners to pay taxes for them and offer them contracts.
Bellanova, who says a failure to pass the proposal could force her to quit the government, has been backed by the interior minister and minister for the south, who also wants to legalise Italy’s army of off-the-books foreign domestic workers who care for the elderly at home.
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