US prison labor tied to some of the world’s most popular food brands

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From the Associated Press

In an exhaustive two-year investigation, The Associated Press found that American prisoners were found in the supply chains of a dizzying array of products, from Frosted Flakes cereal and Ball Park hot dogs to Gold Medal Flour and Coca-Cola. I discovered that related products were mixed in. These can be found on the shelves of most supermarkets, including Kroger, Target, Aldi, and Whole Foods.

Here are the takeaways from the Associated Press investigation:

people of color are disproportionately affected

The United States has a history of incarcerating more people than any other country (currently about 2 million people), and goods related to prison labor have transformed into a vast multibillion-dollar empire, even appearing on license plates. It goes far beyond the classic image of stamps and workers toiling. road worker.

The prisoners who help produce these products are disproportionately people of color. Some people are sentenced to hard labor, forced to work, and punished, but sometimes they are paid only a penny an hour or not at all. They are often excluded from the protections guaranteed to nearly all other full-time workers, even if they are seriously injured or killed on the job. And it can be nearly impossible for them to sue.

And it’s all legal, tracing its origins primarily to the demand for labor as the South struggled to rebuild its shattered economy after the Civil War. In 1865, the Thirteenth Amendment to the U.S. Constitution prohibited slavery and involuntary labor, except as penalties for crimes. The provision is being challenged at the federal level, and efforts to remove similar language from state constitutions are expected to reach votes in about a dozen states this year.

A wide range of companies benefit from prison labor

The Associated Press sought information from all 50 states through public records requests and inquiries to corrections departments, linking hundreds of millions of dollars worth of trade to agricultural-based prison labor in state and federal facilities over the past six years. Ta. These figures include everything from people loaned out to work in private companies to agricultural products and livestock sold on the open market. Although many of these products come from large operations in the South, nearly every state has some type of agricultural program in place.

Reporters also took prisoners in the supply chains of giant corporations such as McDonald’s, Walmart, and Costco, as well as those of goods shipped around the world through multinational companies, including countries that have been subject to import bans by the U.S. government in recent years. discovered that labor was being carried out. For his own use of prison and forced labor.

wide range of work

Nearly every state and federal adult prison in the country has some type of work program, employing about 800,000 people, according to a 2022 report from the American Civil Liberties Union. Most of those jobs are related to jobs such as prison maintenance, laundry, and kitchen work. Some inmates work for state and local governments, doing everything from cleaning up after hurricanes and tornadoes to picking up trash along busy highways.

However, they are contracted out to private companies either directly from prison or through work release programs. They are often employed in industries with severe labor shortages and do some of the dirtiest and most dangerous jobs in the country, including working in poultry farms, meat processing centers and sawmills.

The Associated Press has revealed that inmates with months or years left on their sentences are working in private companies across the country. Unlike the orange jumpsuit-clad garbage pickers, they often wear the same uniform as civilians and are barely noticeable.

Incarcerated people contract with companies affiliated with prisons. In Idaho, the state’s famous potatoes are sorted, packaged, and exported and sold to companies across the country. In Kansas, they are employed by Russell Stover Chocolate Co. and Cal-Maine Foods Co., the nation’s largest egg producer. The company has since ceased operations, but in recent years he was hired by Taylor Farms in Arizona. Taylor Farms sells salad kits at many major grocery stores across the country and also supplies popular fast food chains and restaurants like Chipotle Mexican Grill.

What are companies saying?

Some companies penetrate the supply chain through third-party suppliers without prison workers knowing, while others buy directly. Huge commodity traders essential to feeding the planet, including Cargill, Bunge, Louis-Dreyfus, Archer Daniels Midland, and Consolidated Grain & Verge, are responsible for millions of dollars worth of soybeans, Corn and wheat are scooped directly from the prison farm.

The Associated Press reached out to companies it identified as having ties to prison labor for comment, but most did not respond.

Cargill acknowledged that it buys products from prison farms in Tennessee, Arkansas and Ohio, but said they represent only a small portion of its overall volume. Further, he added, “We are currently in the process of determining appropriate corrective action.”

McDonald’s said it would investigate any links to such labor, and noted that Archer Daniels Midland and General Mills, which produces Gold Medal flour, have policies restricting the use of forced labor by their suppliers. Whole Foods responded flatly: “Whole Foods Market does not permit the use of prison labor in the products we sell in our stores.”

Bunge acknowledged that it had been purchasing grain from the Department of Corrections, but said they were “no longer part of Bunge’s footprint” as it sold the facilities from which it sourced in 2021.

What does the prison say?

Prison officials and other advocates point out that not all work is forced and that prison jobs save taxpayers money. It also said the workers are learning skills they can use once they are released and given a sense of purpose, which could help prevent them from reoffending. In some cases, labor can reduce a sentence. And, they say, work becomes a means of repaying one’s debt to society.

“Many of them grew up in families that never understood what work was and how it felt at the end of the day when you did a job well,” said David Farabaugh, who oversees prison farms in Arkansas. I don’t understand it at all.”

Most critics do not believe that all jobs should be eliminated, but that incarcerated people should be paid a fair wage and treated humanely, and that all jobs should be ​​They argue that it should be proactive.

“They’re being forced to work for little to no pay, and it’s not safe. They’re also not learning skills that will help them when they’re released,” said Roberts, a prison labor expert at Loyola University New Orleans. says law professor Andrea Armstrong.