Migrant workers in meat frigorification: conditions of life and work of the Haitians in Maringá (PR)

• Grant number: 17/22079-9
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Scientific Initiation
• Start date: May 01, 2018
• End date: December 31, 2018
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - Geography - Human Geography
• Principal Investigator: Antonio Thomaz Júnior
• Grantee: Daniel Christante Cantarutti
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Ciências e Tecnologia (FCT). Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP). Campus de Presidente Prudente. Presidente Prudente , SP, Brazil
• Associated research grant: 12/23959-9 - Mapping and analysis of territory of sugarcane agrohidrobusiness in the Pontal do Paranapanema region - São Paulo State - Brazil labor relations, conflict and land and water use and environmental health, AP.BIOEN.TEM

Abstract

At the beginning of the 21st century, migratory flows intensified, in this scenario Brazil emerges as a destination of expressive quantity of international immigrants, especially Haitians who, after the earthquake of 2010, have moved by thousands to Brazil. Fleeing conditions of extreme susceptibility to earthquakes, typhoons, social vulnerability, motivated by abyssal extremes of poverty, these workers seek to find employment and decent living conditions in Brazil. After immersing in Brazilian territory, these immigrant workers are sent to shelters in Acre, where they await the issuance of documents and regularization by the authorities to reside and work in the country. Countless companies move to camps to recruit legal migrants to work. From that moment, the insertion of this labor force in the Brazilian labor market begins, with questionable selection processes, lack of information on the part of the workers, etc. Most of the vacancies offered are in the refrigerators of the south center of the country, among them the GT Foods Company based in Maringá. Thus, we propose to understand the spatial mobility of the work of foreign migrants, especially Haitians to work in the slaughtering and processing of chickens in the metropolitan region of Maringá (PR), specifically within the GT Foods Company. Our focus is on the living and health conditions of Haitian workers who have migrated to work in Brazil, and to investigate the consequences for the organizational spheres (unions and associations) of increasing the number of immigrant workers, as well as to investigate possible actions of resistance and against capital. (AU)