Agricultural worker, Bernardo Reyes, explains some of the improvements he has experienced since Stemilt gained EFI certification. Reyes mentioned how after adding suggestion boxes around the farm, the labor-management collaboration team or EFI Leadership Team, found out that workers were running out of water in the field. This suggestion became a priority for the EFI team because when farmworkers labor all day under the sun without taking adequate water breaks, they face heat-related illnesses such as nausea, dizziness, heat exhaustion, heatstroke, dehydration and even death. After learning of worker concerns, Stemilt’s EFI team worked to develop a system to increase the number of water jugs, create proper storage and cleaning, and ensure they were available and refilled as needed.
While implementing processes to increase access to water, the team noticed that some jugs weren’t being cleaned correctly, so the team developed a class to teach supervisors and workers alike, the accurate way to wash the water containers.
This is an example of a small issue that can be addressed to yield many positive results. EFI teams on farming operations across the Americas are working to solve issues and make improvements that lead to healthier work environments.
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