This and other disturbing facts were shared at yesterday's final conference on the BRIGHT project, which took place in Rome.
It became clear that the problems of women in this sector are far from small and that mobile workers need to be informed in their countries of origin about how to look for job advertisements and what to demand from their employers.
Such campaigns were organized in Bulgaria and Romania, and local labor mediators were trained to disseminate information to those wishing to seek work abroad. Within the framework of the project, a seminar for stakeholder engagement and preparation of joint initiatives was organized in Bulgaria.
According to the director of the Center for Sustainable Communities Development, Stanimira Hadjimitova, although the ideas are there, we still do not have a critical mass to implement the decisions taken.
Italy is also paying close attention to the problem, as nearly 40% of agricultural workers there are women, and more and more women are coming from outside the EU. All of them can be victims of double discrimination – by gender and by origin. Many of them work without contracts and are threatened by their employers that they will be punished if they file a complaint.
In this regard, several municipalities and organizations in southern Italy have signed joint action agreements to protect these women. Moreover, the idea is to impose sanctions at European level by stopping subsidies on farms with poor working conditions. The Italian colleagues managed to create a protected space within the project, where the workers could walk and seek advice and assistance.
The project partners are hopeful that the project should and will continue, because women will be provided with maximum protection of their labor and social rights, as well as services for their children who travel with them or stay in their countries of origin.