Environmental Justice
What does Environmental Justice mean to LCLAA?
Climate change and pollution aren’t abstract concepts to be left to experts and politicians. They are serious challenges that are impacting Latino/a workers here and now! LCLAA has identified several environmental issues that are particularly relevant to working Latino/a families, like the use of highly toxic pesticides in agriculture and the increasing risk of heat-related injury that many workers face due to climate change. Check out the policy areas below to see how we are fighting for environmental justice for Latino/a workers.
Organophosphates (OPs) are commonly used as pesticides despite being associated with serious health complications.
Toxic Pesticides
Over 50 years since Rachel Carson published Silent Spring, a watershed expose on the dangers and impacts of pesticides in the U.S., toxic chemicals remain commonplace in industrial agriculture. But these chemicals don’t only harm the ecosystems where they are used; they also pose a critical danger to workers who must apply them.
Because 64% of all farm workers in the US are Hispanic, the burden of these dangerous chemicals falls overwhelmingly on Latino/a workers, their communities, and their families. That’s why LCLAA fought for over a decade to ban the use of Chlorpyrifos, one of the most hazardous pesticides around.
In August 2021, we finally achieved a ban on the use of Chlorpyrifos on food products from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), with the help of advocacy and legal pressure from our environmental partner Earthjustice. ¡Pero la lucha sigue!
OrganoPhosphates
Chlorpyrifos is just one of 17 highly toxic nerve agents known as organophospates (OPs) that remain legal in many applications, including agricultural ones. Even Chlorpyrifos, which the EPA banned on food crops, can still be used for ornamental crops like Christmas trees and houseplants, harming the workers who apply them and the families who consume these properties.
That’s why LCLAA, in partnership with Earthjustice and other advocacy groups, has expanded our advocacy to target a ban on all OPs. You can help achieve this goal by signing the petition above, and by informing your community about the dangers of OPs using the resources below.
Map of OP concentration on agricultural land in the US, courtesy of Earthjustice.
Heat-Related Injury
As climate change raises average temperatures across the country and around the globe, working people in diverse settings are beginning to feel its effects. But even as it becomes more common, heat-related injury has proven to be a silent threat. It receives little media attention and is surrounded by misconceptions—for example that it mainly impacts those working outside. In fact, such injuries are also common in indoor worksites like bakeries, factories, and Amazon warehouses, many of which lack air conditioning.
The true scope of heat-related injury often goes unseen according to research from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs that found that heat-related injuries are vastly undercounted. While the demographics of these injuries are also often ignored, existing research suggests that Latino/a workers and communities are disproportionately impacted by the phenomenon by a significant margin. One study even found that immigrant workers are three times more likely to suffer heat-induced death on the job than native born workers.
LCLAA is committed to raising awareness about this critical component of environmental justice and is closely monitoring the Occupational Health and Safety Administration’s (OSHA) efforts to protect workers from heat.
Heat-related injuries are not limited to outdoor worksites