Boots and spade

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Boots and spade

The absent worker, the trace they leave

By Paola Rossini

25mm f/25 1/2s ISO 100
Camera: Canon EOS R100 — RF-S 18-45mm f/4.5-6.3 IS STM
Date: 2025-10-26
In 2024 around 1 million farm workers were regularly employed in Italy, but estimates suggest a further 230,000 undeclared, mostly foreign and undocumented.
Italy's 2016 anti-caporalato law punishes the exploitation of farm labour with up to 8 years' imprisonment: in its first seven years it led to over 600 convictions, but the phenomenon still affects around 230,000 workers.
They say we are peasants of the South, but we are peasants of the whole world: the land is not ours, and our blood pays for it.
Bread, Work and Dignity