The Farmworker Association of Florida

FWAF member Yolanda Gómez believes that “another world is possible” within the food production system—a food system that benefits farmworkers, farmers and consumers with food that is healthy, chemical-free, and that achieves social justice.

FWAF is a membership organization of more than 6,330 farmworker families from predominately Mexican, Haitian, Afro-American, Guatemalan and Salvadoran communities. The nonprofit group was founded in 1983 with the goal of building a strong, multi-racial and economically viable organization that would help farmworkers address the social, political, economic, and workplace issues that affect their lives.

FWAF’s members cultivate citrus, ferns, foliage, mushrooms and vegetables in Central and South Florida. In the 1980s, FWAF successfully lobbied to secure benefits for laborers idled by a severe freeze. In 1985, FWAF citrus workers created a business cooperative that employed more than 300 workers. FWAF has helped more than 4,000 Haitian and Hispanic farmworkers establish legal immigration status and provides training on immigrant rights. The group also addresses issues of police harassment, neighborhood crime, and problems with the Border Patrol and federal agencies.

FWAF has won improvements in wages and working conditions from more than 40 Central Florida companies and has campaigned successfully to extend bus service and phone lines to labor camps. Their commitment to improved farmworker housing has included building 78 single-family houses. The Association also has established three ethnic food stores.

Since the early ’90s, FWAF has focused on pesticides, field sanitation, and other health and safety issues. FWAF fought to secure the passage of Florida’s Right-to-Know law to protect workers in the field, regularly files complaints for pesticide-safety violations, and is pressing for better enforcement of state laws designed to protect farmworkers.

FWAF is a founding member of the Farmworker Network and the Farmworker Health and Safety Institute, and is a leading member in PAN’s Organophosphate Alternatives Alliance and PAN’s fumigant campaign.

Alaska Community Action on Toxics

ACAT was established in 1997 to protect environmental and community health by working to “eliminate the production and release of harmful chemicals by industry and military sources.” ACAT actively promotes the Precautionary Principle, vigorously supports the sovereignty of indigenous peoples, and directs four major campaigns: Military Toxics and Health, Northern Contaminants and Health, Pesticide Right-to-Know, and Water Quality Protection.

On March 1, 2007, ACAT and its partners won a major victory when the Alaska Department of Environmental Conservation denied the Alaska Railroad Corporation’s request to spray three herbicides along 600 miles of railways. ADEC received 1,083 letters from concerned citizens (including PAN Action Center members) before deciding that Razor Pro, 2.4-D and Oust Extra posed a threat to 1,500 of the state’s rivers, streams and creeks. ACAT Executive Director Pam Miller noted that herbicide use poses “an unacceptable threat to water quality, fish, wildlife, habitat, and public health.”

In July 2006, an ACAT investigation of the contamination threat posed by scores of abandoned U.S. military bases revealed that residents on St. Lawrence Island had worrisome levels of PCB in their blood.

In 2005, ACAT launched an initiative campaign for a Children’s Health Protection Act to safeguard children from pesticides. ACAT gathered more than enough signatures but the campaign was thwarted when the legislature passed new rules requiring signatures from voters in each of the state’s 35 districts. The law has devastated Alaska’s initiative process.

Every spring, ACAT hosts a pesticide-free garden. The first garden was planted at a local school but the project has now moved to a larger site in downtown Anchorage. Thanks to global warming, ACAT reports that the growing season (which used to run from June 1–September 1) now runs from May 15–September 15.

ACAT has also been a leader with PAN and others in the Ban Lindane NOW! campaign and has represented the North American pesticide movement in the POPs treaty process.

PANNA Affiliates

The following groups have joined the PAN Network since July 2006—either as new members, or by renewing their Affiliate membership. Thank you for your commitment and active involvement!

Action Now Agricultural Resources Center Basel Action Network Beyond Pesticides Bio-Integral Resource Center California Certified Organic Farmers Californians for GE-Free Agriculture Campaign for Pesticide Reduction Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment Canadian Environmental Law Association Center for Agroecology & Sustainable Food Systems (UC Santa Cruz) Center for Biological Diversity Center for Reflection and Action, Inc Center on Race, Poverty and the Environment Citizens for Pesticide Reform Colectivo Ecologista Jalisco Community Alliance with Family Farmers—Davis Corporation of Benedictine Sisters Council on International and Public Affairs Ecology Action Environmental Forum of Marin Equiterre Farmworker Justice Fund Farmworker Association of Florida Florida Consumer Action Network Food and Water Watch

Healthy Children Organizing Project Hilltown Anti-Herbicide Coalition Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy Land Stewardship Project Líderes Campesinas de California Marin Organic Michigan Alliance of Cooperatives Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education Services Corporation of Benedictine Sisters National Campaign for Sustainable Agriculture National Center for Appropriate Technology Non-Toxic Hotline Occidental Arts and Ecology Center Oregon Toxics Alliance Orion Magazine Parents for a Safer Environment Pesticide Alternatives of Santa Clara County Reach for Unbleached! Russian River Watershed Protection Committee Santa Clara Medical Association Saskatchewan Network for Alternatives to Pesticides Strategic Video/Strategic Counsel Texans for Alternatives to Pesticides Yat Ktisichee Native Center