PROGRAMS
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The Farmworker Association
provides a holistic approach to addressing community-identified
needs through workplace and community organizing,
leadership development, health education, and research
projects. The Association helps farmworkers
and other low-wage workers:
- realize their dignity and contributions to
society and the economy
- recognize their own capacity to solve community
problems
- remove the barriers which marginalize them
- raise consciousness within and outside their
communities.
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Pesticide
Actions
Through education and community
organizing, the Farmworker Association of Florida
works to improve farmworkers’ health,
working conditions, and access to quality health
care; raise awareness of the harmful effects
of toxic pesticides; and influence policy related
to health and safety protections for farmworkers. |
Immigrants’ Rights
Low-income immigrant communities have many factors
or barriers that contribute to them being marginalized,
underserved, and underrepresented. FWAF
works to inform immigrant farmworkers of their
rights and engage them in decision-making and
policy-setting processes that impact their lives. |
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Worker Justice
FWAF organizes and builds the skills of farmworkers
to address injustice in the workplace, such as
wage theft, and the impacts of globalization and
mechanization. In addition, the Association
works with minority small farmers to access the
resources necessary to maintain and improve their
farm operations. |
Health
Education
Often farmworker communities
lack knowledge about preventive health care
and community health resources available to
them. The Farmworker Association provides
community education and health referrals in
the areas of vocational rehabilitation, pregnancy,
HIV and STDs, and women’s health issues.
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Research Projects
The effects of pesticide exposure on farmworker
health has been appallingly understudied. In
an effort to bring attention to farmworker health
problems and to reduce the adverse effects of pesticide
exposure, FWAF has conducted community health surveys,
and has been the community partner in two community/academic
research projects. |
Disaster
Response and Relief
Following natural disasters, such as hurricanes,
tornadoes, and flooding, low-income immigrant communities
have consistently been slow to receive assistance,
and are often the victims of discriminatory and
inadequate services. FWAF works to organize
communities to know their rights in responding
to disasters. |
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"“We
were uneducated. We did not know the dangers of working
with the pesticides in the fields. Nobody told us how to
protect ourselves and what to wear. Until the Farmworker
Association came into the community, we were not aware of the
chemicals they were using and what they could do to our health. The
Farmworker Association educated and organized the community and
that is when things started to change for our people.”
Geraldean Matthew, Former Farmworker / Community Organizer
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