Who Grows Our Food

It only takes a few minutes watching the men and women who grow our food to be truly humbled. Never have I seen people working harder, moving faster, with a single dedication to pick and deliver product. They are driven by piece work rates, meaning they must harvest quickly to earn a living.

Stoop labor like picking strawberries is hard on the body — bent over you can imagine the aching backs and pulled hamstrings, but they just keep going. Half an hour for lunch and back to work.

Picking lemons is also hard — balancing on ladders, leaning into trees with sharp thorns and twigs, carrying a heavy pick bag and then running to dump the bags into the collection bin.

These migrant laborers — Mexicans, Guatemalans, Hondurans and their fellow workers do the work that many other people would not. In Ventura, Los Angeles, Orange, and Central Valley counties, as well as other parts of California, they are the force that puts food on our tables. Without them, life would be very different.