North Palm Beach, FL - In a unique meeting in North Palm Beach, the Florida Catholic Conference brought together leaders of Florida's farmworker organizations, agricultural leaders from government and industry, faith-based farmworker advocates, and distinguished scholars and policy experts from around the country.

The Forum built on the foundation laid by the United States Catholic Conference of Bishops with its pastoral statement in 2003, "For I Was Hungry and You Gave Me Food: Catholic Reflections on Food, Farming, and Farmworkers."  Taking that document another step, the Florida Catholic Conference convened the Forum to examine Florida's particular agricultural labor situation in light of moral principles, current data, and best practices.

Leading stakeholders in Florida agricultural labor were invited, as well as representatives of Catholic and interfaith organizations involved in advocacy related to food and farming.  In the opening session, Bishop John H. Ricard SSJ (Diocese of Pensacola-Tallahassee and Episcopal Moderator for Social Concerns for the Florida Catholic Conference) urged participants to identify common ground and possibilities for change that would be not merely in their own interest, but to the common good.

The "Farmworker Forum" was designed to create conditions most conducive to developing mutual respect and thereby a greater capacity to work together to improve the conditions of farmworkers in Florida.   About fifty people participated in some portion of the two and a half days at Our Lady of Florida Spiritual Center.

"We used a retreat center to help people shut out distractions and get to know each other in a beautiful, relaxed environment, where the only agenda was to examine the issues from a variety of analytical and experiential vantage points. To put people at ease, everything was off the record and there was no legislation or particular controversy on the table for discussion," said D. Michael McCarron, Executive Director of the Florida Catholic Conference.

"The social teaching of the Catholic Church emphasizes that every human person has dignity and value by virtue of being a child of God.  This seems, as one grower who attended put it, like "common sense," but unfortunately, it is not common practice. Too often, society accords dignity and value in relation to a person's wealth and position and manual laborers feel they get little respect or consideration," said Nancy Powers, farmworker affairs consultant to the FCC. 

"When you're in someone's office or at their committee meeting, they are in charge and they set the agenda.  But at the Forum, the Commissioner of Agriculture, the president of St. Thomas University, and the president of a Florida agricultural association sat side by side on panels with leaders from the farmworker community. People who might never agree to sit down at a one-on-one meeting had the chance to hear each other and discover the reasonable, thoughtful person on the other side of the table.  That was accomplishment number one," Powers said.

Dr. Mary Carter Waren, Assistant Professor at St. Thomas University in Miami, facilitated the meeting.  Workers were represented by leading members of the Farmworker Association of Florida, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Farmworker Self-Help, and United Farm Workers of America.  Presenters included the president of St. Thomas University, Monsignor Franklyn Casale, and the Commissioner of Agriculture of the state of Florida, Charles Bronson, among many others. 

Scholars presented data on current Florida immigration patterns and agricultural labor markets.  Farmworkers and advocates discussed the impact on farmworkers from current trends in market concentration, trade, and immigration. Growers and workers' advocates both emphasized the mutual benefit of comprehensive immigration reform that would allow workers to come to the United States and work in the fields without fear.

A major focus was how individuals, employers, policy makers, and faith-based institutions might better support systemic changes to empower farmworkers and help them live in more dignified conditions.  One strategy considered was faith based investing-that is, using the pension or other investment funds of religious institutions in ways that would support and promote socially responsible corporate policies.

"We couldn't hear from everyone or take up every issue in two and a half days, but we did cover a lot of ground.  Everyone there was an expert, but many said the Forum sessions exposed them to vantage points they never get in their daily work. For example, pastoral leaders heard global analyses of the causes of the problems they see every day in their one-on-one pastoral care, whereas trade policy experts heard the daily experience of workers and farmers, that is, the grassroots consequences of the situations they study at a global level," Powers said.   

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