According to Dr. Jessica Hernandez, a Zapotec scholar and board member of Sustainable Seattle, “indigenous peoples are the first impacted by climate change.” She points to the fate of the small municipality of San Pablo Tijaltepec, high in the Sierra Mixteca of Oaxaca, in southern Mexico: “Accelerated changes to our climate due to urbanization, fossil fuel industry, etc. continues to result in devastating impacts. The heavy rains that have recently taken place in Oaxaca, Mexico, have destroyed many of the harvests Indigenous peoples depend on. For the pueblo San Pablo Tijaltepec, their milpas [corn fields] were completely destroyed. This leaves 800 Mixtec families without the communal harvest they all depend on.”
Losing the milpas and harvest is a blow that falls on people already having a hard time surviving. The Mexican government says family income in the municipality averages about $500/month, leaving half its residents in extreme poverty. In 2020 only an eighth of San Pablo Tijaltepec had access to a sewage system, and over a tenth had no electricity. The region’s Mixteco-speaking people have been leaving and searching for work for decades as a result, joining the 400,000 who leave Oaxaca for northern Mexico and the U.S. every year.
In California’s southern San Joaquin Valley, the most productive agricultural region of the world, people from San Pablo Tijaltepec have created a new home, an extension of their Oaxacan community, in the small town of Taft. For over two decades they’ve worked as farmworkers in the surrounding fields. Here, instead of torrential rains, they face another environmental danger – the summer’s heat, which can rise to over 110 degrees in July and August.
The connection between climate change and increasing summer temperatures has been dramatized by the “heat dome” that covered the Pacific Northwest in July, leading to similar temperatures in a region accustomed to lesser heat. Portland had a high of 116 degrees. In the nearby Willamette Valley one farmworker, Sebastian Francisco Perez, died as he continued to work in the heat, moving irrigation pipes, in order to pay a debt to a “coyote” who’d smuggled him across the border. Scientists, and even President Biden, attributed the heat dome to climate change and its associated drought.
In the southern San Joaquin Valley town of Poplar, extreme heat in the summer is the normal condition in which people live and work. It is one of the poorest communities in the state. Air conditioning in trailer homes or crowded houses normally consists of old swamp coolers, which hardly lower temperatures. At work people bundle up, using layers of clothing to insulate against heat and dust.
Poplar’s families are almost all immigrants or their children, who have traveled here from other parts of Mexico, or have crossed the Pacific Ocean from the Philippines. Many now are older people, long accustomed to the heat. Yet for them the danger is greater as they get older. Some already have health conditions springing from poverty and the hard conditions in the fields. “In extreme heat, the body must work extra hard to maintain a healthy temperature,” cautions health journalist Liz Seegert. “Older adults are at higher risk for heat stroke, heat cramps, heat exhaustion and other serious health issues due to poorer circulation and less effective sweating that comes with aging.”
This rural poverty of the southern San Joaquin stands in stark contrast to the enormous wealth the labor of its people produce. Poplar’s Tulare County produced $7.2 billion in fruit, nuts and vegetables last year. Yet the average income of a county resident is $17,888 per year, compared to a U.S. average of $28,555, and 123,000 of Tulare’s 453,000 residents live below the poverty line. Poverty forced farmworkers to continue working during the pandemic. Tulare County’s COVID-19 infection rate was much greater, per capita, than large cities. A year ago Tulare had 7,603 confirmed cases, and 168 deaths. Heavily urban Alameda County had 9,411 confirmed cases and 167 deaths. But Alameda County’s population is 1.67 million, over three times that of Tulare County.
These farmworker communities have fewer resources, but they are creative and resilient. Poplar’s Larry Itliong Resource Center holds vaccination clinics and campaigns for a park where people can find shade in the heat. Legal aid workers in Taft provide counseling about labor and tenant rights in indigenous languages like Mixteco. A history of farm labor activism in the San Joaquin Valley stretches back to the great grape strike of 1965, led by Larry Itliong, for whom the Poplar center is named, as well as Cesar Chavez, Dolores Huerta and others.
Rosalinda Guillen, director of the women-led farmworker organization Community to Community in Washington State, condemns the system of corporate agriculture for treating farm workers as disposable. “The nation’s farmworkers,” she says, “should be recognized as a valuable skilled workforce, able to use their knowledge to innovate sustainable practices. Most are indigenous immigrants, and have the right to maintain cultural traditions and languages, and to participate with their multicultural neighbors in building a better America.”
These photographs are a reality check, showing the lives of these communities of the southern San Joaquin Valley as they deal with the impact of climate change, poverty and displacement.
ARVIN, CA – Presiliano Silva is an irrigator, and cleans the irrigation ditch next to a field that will be planted with organic vegetables. Because it is organic, the grower can’t use herbicide and instead the irrigator removes the weeds. The temperature at the time, about 6 in the morning, was over 80 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Photo by David BaconARVIN, CA – Presiliano Silva is an irrigator, and cleans the irrigation ditch next to a field that will be planted with organic vegetables. Because it is organic, the grower can’t use herbicide and instead the irrigator removes the weeds. The temperature at the time, about 6 in the morning, was over 80 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Silva drinks water at a shade station for irrigators. Photo by David BaconARVIN, CA – Presiliano Silva is an irrigator, and cleans the irrigation ditch next to a field that will be planted with organic vegetables. Because it is organic, the grower can’t use herbicide and instead the irrigator removes the weeds. The temperature at the time, about 6 in the morning, was over 80 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Silva drinks water at a shade station for irrigators. Copyright David BaconTAFT, CA – The Comite formed by indigenous immigrants from the Oaxacan town of San Pablo Tijaltepec, living in Taft. The community is Mixteco-speaking, and people work as farmworkers in the southern San Joaquin Valley. In the evening the temperature is still over 80 degrees, and reaches 110 in the afternoon. The comite members are Felipe Gonzalez, Enrique Garcia, Juan Lopez and Alfredo Cruz. They stand together with Fausto Sanchez (second from left), a Mixtec community worker for California Rural Legal Assistance, who helps community members understand their labor and housing rights. Photo by David BaconARVIN, CA – Adrian Garcia is an irrigator, and he cuts off the loss of water from the end of a drip irrigation hose in a field of recently planted grape vines. The temperature at the time, about 6 in the morning, was over 80 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Photo by David BaconARVIN, CA – Adrian Garcia is an irrigator, and he cuts off the loss of water from the end of a drip irrigation hose in a field of recently planted grape vines. The temperature at the time, about 6 in the morning, was over 80 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Photo by David BaconKINGSBURG, CA – Farmworkers pick plums in a field near Kingsburg, in the San Joaquin Valley, in a crew of Mexican immigrants. The temperature at the time, about 10 in the morning, was over 90 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Juan Flores Rangel is a picker in the crew. Photo by David BaconKINGSBURG, CA – Farmworkers pick plums in a field near Kingsburg, in the San Joaquin Valley, in a crew of Mexican immigrants. The temperature at the time, about 10 in the morning, was over 90 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Ruben Figueroa is a picker in the crew. Photo by David BaconKINGSBURG, CA -Farmworkers pick plums in a field near Kingsburg, in the San Joaquin Valley, in a crew of Mexican immigrants. The temperature at the time, about 10 in the morning, was over 90 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Reginaldo Morelos is a picker in the crew. Photo by David BaconKINGSBURG, CA – Farmworkers pick plums in a field near Kingsburg, in the San Joaquin Valley, in a crew of Mexican immigrants. The temperature at the time, about 10 in the morning, was over 90 degrees, and would reach over 110 in the afternoon. Juan Flores Rangel is a picker in the crew. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Filipino farmworkers pick table grapes in a field near Poplar, in the San Joaquin Valley. Most workers wear facemasks or bandannas as a protection against spreading the coronavirus. Annie Domingo came from Laoag, in Ilocos Norte province of the Philippines, 45 years ago, when she was 15 years old. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Filipino farmworkers pick table grapes in a field near Poplar, in the San Joaquin Valley. Most workers wear facemasks or bandannas as a protection against spreading the coronavirus. Adelina Asuncion came from Laoag, in Ilocos Norte province of the Philippines, in 1977. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Filipino farmworkers pick table grapes in a field near Poplar, in the San Joaquin Valley. Most workers wear facemasks or bandannas as a protection against spreading the coronavirus. Teresita Mateo came from Laoag, in Ilocos Norte province of the Philippines. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Organizers and volunteers prepare for a COVID vaccination clinic at the Larry Itliong Resource Center in Poplar, a farm worker town where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Volunteers sort clothes to give away to young people who come to be vaccinated. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Organizers and volunteers prepare for a COVID vaccination clinic at the Larry Itliong Resource Center in Poplar, a farm worker town where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. People wait at the center entrance for vaccinations to begin. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Organizaers and volunteers prepare for a COVID vaccination clinic at the Larry Itliong Resource Center in Poplar, a farm worker town where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Sarabi Pintar and Emily Cruz Padilla wait at the center entrance for vaccinations to begin. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Organizers and volunteers prepare for a COVID vaccination clinic at the Larry Itliong Resource Center in Poplar, a farm worker town where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Sarabi Pintar and Emily Cruz Padilla wait at the center entrance for vaccinations to begin. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – A farm worker family’s home in Campo California, a colonia outside of Poplar. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Homes and people in a working class neighborhood of a farm worker town. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Homes and people in a working class neighborhood of a farm worker town. Lupe Aldaco moved into this house that was falling apart five years ago, and then fixed it up, and added a trailer in back for her son and others to live in. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Homes and people in a working class neighborhood of a farm worker town. Rachele Alcantar lives in a trailer (rent$500/mo) with her husband Jose Serna, her son Victor Alcantar and her baaby Ezekiel Serna. She was just elected to the local school board. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Homes and people in a working class neighborhood of a farm worker town. Rachele Alcantar lives in a trailer (rent$500/mo) with her husband Jose Serna, her son Victor Alcantar and her baaby Ezekiel Serna. She was just elected to the local school board. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Families in a working class neighborhood of a farmworker town try to survive when the temperature rises to 115 degrees. Rachele Alcantar lives in a trailer with her husband Jose Serna, her son Victor Alcantar and her baby Ezekiel Serna. She was just elected to the local school board. She braids her daughter’s hair. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Reginaldo Lacambacal is a Filipina immigrant who came to the U.S. from Laoag in the Philippines in the 1970s, and worked as a farmworker for many years. He lives in Poplar a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Reginaldo and Gloria Lacambacal are Filipino immigrants who came to the U.S. from Laoag in the Philippines in the 1970s, and worked as farmworkers for many years. They live in Poplar a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Gloria Lacambacal is a Filipina immigrant who came to the U.S. from Laoag in the Philippines in the 1970s, and worked as a farmworker for many years. She lives in Poplar a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Leandro Mesa Valdez is an immigrant who came to the U.S. as a boy with his father Santiago from Remedios, Durango. His father was a bracero who worked in Idaho, and when he died Leandro settled in Poplar, a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. He doesn’t know how old he is, and the community looks out for him when he sometimes wanders off. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – Leandro Mesa Valdez is an immigrant who came to the U.S. as a boy with his father Santiago from Remedios, Durango. His father was a bracero who worked in Idaho, and when he died Leandro settled in Poplar, a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. He doesn’t know how old he is, and the community looks out for him when he sometimes wanders off. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – People surviving the heat in the park of a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Jose Salazar is a retired farmworker who comes to the park every day to see his friends and relax in the shade. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – People surviving the heat in the park of a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. A group of friends – Maria Elena Leon, Agustin Rivas and Ignacio – come to play cards and relax in the shade. Photo by David BaconPOPLAR, CA – People surviving the heat in the park of a farm worker town, where the temperature rises to 115 degrees in the mid-afternoon. Wilfredo Nevares (Picho), a retired farmworker, comes to the park every day to see his friends and relax in the shade. He is dying of cancer, which he believes is due to pesticide exposure. Art Rodriguez, an organizer with at the Larry Itliong Resource Center, is Nevares’ nephew. He fought to get the shade built, but says that’s not enough. “Will there be a place donde my tia and Picho (and many more to come) can come to enjoy their golden years in life; where it’s cool in the summer and warm in the winter?” he asks. ” We will have a place where my viejitos can chill soon enough. We have every right to expect that, nothing less and nothing more.” The struggle to win better conditions in Poplar has been bitter, but it made him stronger. “Thank you Tulare County for the plethora of difficult lessons you taught me,” he says. “You have made me more resilient, more patient, more astute, more loving, more committed, more responsible, more honorable.” Photo by David Bacon
