SUGARCOATED SERVITUDEThe Casualties of Brazil’s Biofuel RevolutionBY HENRIK JÖNSSON PHOTOS BY ANDERS KRISTENSSON
Brazil and the US are the world’s largest producers of biofuel, cranking out 72 percent of the global ethanol supply every year. In 2007, both countries committed to a pact that’s supposed to help wean the world off the oil industry’s massive, petroleum-lactating tits. If you’re like most nonboring human beings, you probably have no clue and don’t give a shit about how ethanol is made. We’ll spare you the drawn-out science-y explanation and make it simple: Ethanol is produced from corn or sugarcane. In the US, ethanol companies buy corn from farmers and everybody goes home happy. But Brazilians rely on a much different and more dubious source of production: migrant workers who are bused in from surrounding villages and paid around $1.60 an hour to cut and harvest sugarcane in 90-degree heat.
A recent study by sociologist Maria Aparecida de Moraes Silva of São Paulo State University shows that cane harvesters are treated shittier and have shorter life spans than 19th-century plantation slaves. They also frequently suffer heart attacks in the field due to exhaustion. You’d probably have chest pains too if your daily existence consisted of cutting half a mile of sugarcane, which is the typical quota for a harvester. Every morning a company bus picks up day laborers from the villages surrounding the Santa Cruz ethanol factory on the east side of Brazil. They’re handpicked by asshole opportunists, aka gatos, who “hire” migrants in the town square around harvest time. Given that only a select few workers possess an employment contract, it’s a marginally legal way for the ethanol factories to dodge taxes, employer fees, and liability. 
| Laborers wash their filthy, sweat-stained clothes in a communal sink outside their living quarters. |
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An engineer processes sugarcane extract into ethanol.
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| Fresh from washing up, a worker pauses to reflect on his day in the fields inside his (very tiny) room. |
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A sugarcane harvester hacks through his workaday predicament.
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The day I arrive is just like any other. The fields were full of young people who are unable to find a better way to make a living. Geraldo is a 22-year-old who recently experienced his first shift as a sugarcane cutter. Early in the day he ripped off his long-sleeved shirt and collapsed in the shade. “Do what you like!” he shouted. “Fire me! I’m not going to continue. I’m not made for this. It’s inhuman.”
Just last month a 20-year-old worker named Lourenço Paulino de Souza died from a heart attack on his first shift as a day laborer. It’s a paradox: In one of the richest regions in Brazil, migrant families chip in for bus tickets and send their sons off into the sugarcane fields to meet uncertain fates. “What are we supposed to do?” asked Eufrase Nobre, a 35-year-old immigrant from the inhospitable inlands of Bahia.
See all articles by this contributor Anonymous, on Oct 10, 2009 wrote:
Brasil is not only gisele bunchen and ronaldo. we live a shitty life here too. dont belive the hype. | | Anonymous, on Sep 21, 2009 wrote:
As much as I complain about my life sometimes, I got it sooooooooooooooo easy compared to these guys. Great story. | | Anonymous, on Jun 3, 2009 wrote:
But is the same true in Brazil? It doesn’t sound like it. | | Anonymous, on Jun 3, 2009 wrote:
i work in a sugarmill in guatemala as an engineer and i have to say that working in the fields is easily the toughest job in the process, yet workers are given here a place to stay, food and plenty of electrolitic fluids to stay hidrated. they are so energetic that they will demand playing soccer at noon during lunch time. they conditions are not as bad as they used to be, workers have free medical treatmet clinic, dental clinic and schools built for their families. so its tough job, but its not slavery | | Anonymous, on May 27, 2009 wrote:
brazil: famous asses, famous mistreatment of the average jose | | Anonymous, on May 19, 2009 wrote:
correct me if i missed something, but why don’t they just invest in growing corn instead? | | Anonymous, on May 19, 2009 wrote:
Ever heard of "cane-claw"? That’s some fucked up shit. | | Anonymous, on May 19, 2009 wrote:
Oh well, what ever saves the earth! | |
| bad news brown, on May 18, 2009 wrote:
a heart attack at 20 years of age?! jesus, what are they having them doing in those fields? | | Anonymous, on May 18, 2009 wrote:
1.60 an hour? goddamn! i don’t know what the living costs are like in brazil, but i’m sure 1.60 an hour ain’t gonna cut it | | Anonymous, on May 18, 2009 wrote:
they call the workers “cold grub"... that goes to show you how respected they are. they equate them to food. but not just any food, shitty food | | Anonymous, on May 18, 2009 wrote:
these dudes are all jacked!! maybe I shouldnt so so excited about that. after all,they got that way from basically doing slave labor, so...yeah. not cool. | |
| aahhhhB, on May 15, 2009 wrote:
ignorance is bliss. if I was helping produce ethanol i think I’d rather not know too | | Anonymous, on May 15, 2009 wrote:
honestly, their living conditions aren’t THAT bad. looks like they have their own beds and little tables and a mattress. I mean, its not luxury, but its worlds better than the stuff Vice showed in Dubai | | Anonymous, on May 15, 2009 wrote:
I think the ’3rd world’ should suffer some kind of massive epidemic, massively reducing its population. The 1st world should switch to a more localised, domestic agriculture. That way the irreplaceable rainforests and biodiversity of the world can at least be partially preserved.
This sugar cane bullshit is the product of people becoming economic animals, in a world where everyone strives towards a north American standard of living. | | Anonymous, on May 14, 2009 wrote:
rain forests? doesn’t sugarcane grow in sugarcane fields? and i believe it grows back very quickly. the humans are the tragedy in this one not the precious rain forests. | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
You still haven’t seen my country, Dom. Rep. Haitians are treated like shit and get payed like 2 dollars a day.... they live in miserable conditions... | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
who needs a rain forest anyway? | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
@Three down:
Get a clue. It’s supposed to show you how corporations are once again taking advantage of people with no other options. Why do you think we have anti-trust laws in America? Partially so things like this don’t happen here. | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
Hey anonymous asshole. Though, you seem super intelligent with your privileged opinions about the strong and the weak, you may take note that Brazil is a completely different country from Mexico. They don’t use the "peso" as you have said. There it’s the "real" (rr-ee-al). Something else you may want to note for your future, they speak Portuguese there too...not "Mexican" as you might call it...Spanish as other more intelligent people might.
Sometimes people are put in a position where there is no other choice but to take shit jobs that might kill them. Only after enduring such a job can they make the decision of whether or not they’d like to live with their family in destitution or die alone while providing their family nothing but loss.
So, to you: Fuck off. They know what a tough decision means. | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
their motto is go hard or go home (in a coffin) | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
"This is the price at which you eat sugar in Europe"... | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
This shit sucks for the workers, but fuck your cynicism vice. I usually agree with you, but these dirt farmers apparently can’t find any other work, at least they have a chance to make some pesos. The strong will survive, the weak need not apply.... the foolish will over-work themselves into heart attacks. Also way to miss the fact that as far as ethanol goes, corn is TOTAL unsustainable bullshit whereas sugar cane is FAR more suitable. How about the fact that brazil is running enormous amounts of infrastructure on ethanol now too?? | |
| place kicker, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
i’ve seen a sugarcane farm where the donkeys turn the grinder and i thought that was sad but it’s nothing compared to this. | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
Sadly, this is par for the course in our new era of capitalism.
The recent economic troubles mean that corporations being forced to cut costs will simply rely on this type of labour more and more, as it costs them less to make their enormous profits.
Until we have evolved into a more socially-minded society, this economic slavery will continue unabated. WAKE UP, people! | |
| Dilettante, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
Brazil has a long tradition of slave type labor- rolling stone did an article on migrant slave-labor farms two years ago | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
it’s great that i can read articles like this that aren’t in like the freakin new yorker or utne or whatever. thank you vice. | |
| Chloro-Phil, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
How backwards is it that the ones in the fields are left to their own safety measures while the man in the factory, no doubt with air conditioning, has earplugs, a helmet, and a polo shirt uniform? | | |
| aahhhhB, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
great read! i love Vice’s expose type stories. You guys have done your part on exposing people to the darker side of society. I hope there is more to come about this story | | Anonymous, on May 13, 2009 wrote:
I think if people are dying on day one, thats a pretty good indicator that things are seriously fucked | | | Next 30 comments > |
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