The Altria family of companies, including Philip Morris USA, does not condone the unlawful employment or exploitation of farm workers and actively works to address issues associated with farm labor.
PM USA supports a reasonable system to provide tobacco farmers with a reliable source of legal workers and addresses issues associated with farm labor in a number of ways:
- We do not condone the unlawful employment or exploitation of farm workers.
- We support laws and inspections overseen by the Department of Labor.
- Our contracts with growers require all domestic contracted growers to certify in writing (at contract time and upon delivery of tobacco) that all of their tobacco is produced using Good Agriculture Practices (GAP) defined by the companies.
- Employees must promptly report actual or suspected breaches of suppliers' contractual obligations or supplier misconduct to company management.
We believe that engagement with growers is the best way to enhance farm conditions and promote quality labor standards for their workers. To help growers address these and other important agricultural issues, we promote the use of best practices in tobacco farming through the following activities:
Communication and engagementAnnually, we provide growers with a GAP handbook that reinforces our expectations that they comply with the Federal Fair Labor Standards and the Migrant and Seasonal Workers Protection Acts. Included in the GAP handbook is information from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Worker Protection Standard, including how workers can be protected from exposure to pesticides.
We actively engage growers in the use of GAP, including the use of crop protection agents, farm safety and maintaining complete labor records.
In 2010, PM USA took additional steps to enhance our domestic GAP programs that:
- required all domestic contracted growers to certify in writing (at contract time and upon delivery of tobacco) that all of their tobacco is produced using Good Agriculture Practices defined by the companies;
- expanded communications related to Green Tobacco Sickness, like including dehydration information;
- launched an on-farm GAP assessment process using unaffiliated third-party assessors (assessments include a review of required documentation and visual observation of specific on-farm GAP); and
- provided growers with a farm worker safety kit produced by the National Education Center for Agricultural Safety.
We engage with growers through annual grower meetings, newsletters and farm visits on issues important to tobacco farming, including labor. We aim to understand the challenges growers face and to tailor our programs and communications to help them address those issues.
Grower representatives for the company are a key component of our engagement efforts. They live and work in the growing communities and are responsible for contacting and visiting Tobacco Leaders Program growers. They communicate PM USA's business requirements and expectations and provide information on tobacco practices consistent with GAP. We also regularly engage with growers through local Grower Councils.
Education and trainingWe support university research and extension programs in several areas of tobacco science that may have an impact on labor practices. Much of our work with land-grant universities is intended to further grower education on the following topics:
- Harvesting and curing tobacco
- Mechanization in burley growing
- Communication on issues related to farm worker safety in grower communities
- Training for extension agents on issues of importance to the tobacco growing community
Through our support, tobacco specialists generate information for sharing throughout cooperative extension networks.
