09 Nov Women Migrant Workers united for a decent work
Donate so that the organized women workers of the Sinaloa Temporary Migrant Workers Coalition receive training with gender perspective and continue fighting for their labor rights.
Olivia is a woman originally from the port of Topolobampo in Sinaloa. Given the few job opportunities offered in her hometown, Olivia, like many people from the town, had to go out to look for job opportunities beyond Mexico.
Olivia crossed the border for 25 years to work in the United States, under the H2 visa program. On each occasion, she had to leave her children behind, while she went out to seek a better future for her family. The distance and long absences made Olivia miss many important moments such as graduations, birthdays; and, in turn, her children had to grow up alone, without their mother.
While her daughter and sons grew up missing their mother, Olivia had to start her path into migrant work, characterized by high levels of human rights’ violations and abuses. Since recruitment and during her work in the United States, Olivia faced many discriminatory practices and mistreatment, due to her condition as a woman: sexual harassment, wage gap, threats against her family, among many others.
The United States is the first destination country in the world, with 51 million international migrants each year.
Currently, there is a US visa system for temporary migrant workers (H2), in sectors such as agriculture (H2A) and services (H2B). This visa system seeks to offer migrant workers better job opportunities and respond to a demand for labor in various sectors and states of the United States. Due to the proximity to Mexico, most recipients of H2 visas are Mexican.
In 2022, 422,980 temporary migrant workers were from Mexico, assigned to workspaces in the States of Arizona, California, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana, among others.
The H2 visa system has been associated with several risks and difficulties in recent years. From recruitment, and during their stay in the United States and return to Mexico, people receiving an H2 visa face a constant vulnerability that allows their human labor rights to be violated.
Although women are to a lesser extent applicants and recipients of H2 visas, those who decide to apply face additional violence specific to their gender, such as harassment and sexual harassment by recruiters and supervisors, humiliation and physical or psychological attacks, the assignment of certain tasks specific to the traditional role as women, lower payments, among others. In 2022, the Mexican National Human Rights Commission received 2,064 complaints related to fraud and exploitation associated with H2 visas.
Given the continuous violations of their labor human rights, a group of temporary migrants, including Olivia, decided to create the Sinaloa Temporary Migrant Workers Coalition (2013) with the hope of achieving full respect of their rights. The Coalition is a space that seeks to organize workers to advocate for their human labor rights.
10 years after its creation, the Coalition has expanded to more than 200 members and has follow more than 2,000 cases of temporary migrants, from its Center for Assistance, Advice and Attention to Migrant Workers (CAAATM), located in Topolobampo.
Little by little, the Coalition was consolidated with enthusiastic and organized women, wishing to form a group of women who could defend, promote, exchange, attend and advocate for labor human rights of women temporary migrant workers. This is how, on April 8, 2022, a Women’s Committee was officially created, made up of and for women temporary migrant workers, their daughters, mothers, and wives of workers.
Why do we URGE gender training?
The Coalition’s Women’s Committee provides advice to women temporary migrant workers so that they know their labor rights when they migrate to the United States to work. Understanding the differentiated experiences that women face, the Committee wishes to update itself to provide a specialized service with gender perspective. Its goal is to empower more women for them to fight for better working and living conditions. To this end, the women of the Coalition wish to be advised by a gender expert to analyze the problems faced by women temporary migrant workers and to be able to provide specialized advice to those women arriving at the Center.
With only 250 Mexican pesos we can make it happen! With your donation, you will help the women of the Committee to receive a training with gender perspective to provide better advises and assessment to the cases presented in the Coalition’s Center.
I want to donate to migrant women workers united for decent employment!
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