Workers in France’s champagne industry are underpaid and forced to sleep on the streets and steal food to stave off hunger, according to an investigation by the Guardian.
In the town of Epernay, home to some of the world’s most exclusive champagne brands, including Moët & Chandon and Mercier, workers from West Africa and Eastern Europe wonder if they are not being paid for their work. , alleging that they are receiving illegally low wages from the vineyard. Near town.
The Guardian found workers in the town sleeping on the streets or in tents as there was no accommodation in the vineyard. Other workers staying in nearby villages said they were forced to steal food from locals because there was nowhere to buy it.
Last year, 300 million bottles of champagne from vineyards in northern France were shipped around the world, generating 6 billion euros in revenue.
However, the Champagne industry has been hit by a series of controversies over the treatment of grape pickers, with four workers dying from suspected sunstroke during last year’s harvest. Four people, including the vineyard owner, were charged with human trafficking in the case, which is expected to go to court early next year.
In Epernay, the magnificent offices of some of the world’s most exclusive champagne brands line the city’s Rue des Champagnes. It is reported that tens of millions of bottles of champagne are stored in the basement, and the street has been dubbed “the richest street in the world.” ”.
A few minutes’ walk away, dozens of workers harvesting Champagne grapes are preparing to sleep in the doorway of a movie theater across from the town’s main train station.
Another group from French-speaking Africa gathers their belongings hidden in the bushes after returning from a day’s picking grapes. One of them, Yunis, has been working in the vineyard for three days, but remains vague about where he will sleep tonight, saying he will sleep “outside.”
Younis, like other workers, was drawn to the region by the promise of well-paying jobs harvesting the world’s most expensive grapes from August to September. Even the cheapest bottles of champagne are rarely sold for less than £20.
Another worker, Nora*, said she was left sleeping on a soaking wet mattress inside a tent after heavy rain during this year’s harvest. She says they were under pressure to work faster. “Every night we thought we would be fired the next morning.” According to her payslip, she was paid less than the French minimum hourly wage and was not paid overtime.
The union blames the vineyard’s continued blind acceptance of cheap labor and the vineyard’s overall failure to ban exploitative labor providers. They say some vineyard owners try to justify themselves by claiming they are “helping African immigrants” by giving them jobs, even at low wages. It is said that there are some people.
“It’s greed. Grapes are sold for €10 to €12 (£8 to £10) per kilo, so it’s shocking to treat people so badly,” said the Confederation of Champagne Workers (CGT). says José Blanco, the union’s secretary general. region. “They see them as machines, not people.”
KAnuté was living in Paris when he heard there was a “job in the countryside” that promised 80 euros a day. Originally an immigrant from Mali, he had survived for 10 years working a series of low-paying cleaning and dishwashing jobs, so he jumped at the opportunity.
Days after starting work in September 2023, Kanoute, 30, found himself and more than 50 other workers, most of them illegal immigrants from West Africa, hungry and in a dilapidated building in Nestlé Village. He said that he realized that he lived in a house that had been destroyed. Le Pont is on the Champagne tourist route in northeastern France.
According to Kanoute, they had to survive on just one sandwich a day given to them at lunch as they moved between the area’s vineyards, but in desperation they had to resort to buying food from neighboring fields in the village. It is said that he started stealing.
sign up for Global dispatch
Get a different view of the world with the best news, features and photos hand-picked by our global development team
Privacy Notice: Newsletters may include information about charities, online advertising, and content sponsored by external parties. Please see our Privacy Policy for more information. We use Google reCaptcha to protect our website and are subject to the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service.
After newsletter promotion
When we condemn what is happening in Champagne, it is an omerta. everyone shut up
Jose Blanco, CGT Labor Union
“We worked hard and were promised salaries and bonuses, but we got nothing,” he says. “We went around ringing people’s doorbells looking for cigarettes. Sometimes people would slam their doors when they saw us coming. It was an insult to our dignity.”
The legal minimum wage was 9.23 euros per hour after deductions, and workers were to be paid between 100 and 110 euros each day, much higher than the 80 euros promised by the recruiter. Kanoute said she was ultimately paid €200 by her provider for a week’s work. Most of the other workers are said to have returned to Paris without being paid anything for their work.
“They were treated like dogs,” says a former wine producer who lives across the street from the village workers’ homes. “Those who do that are exploiters, not wine producers. It’s a shame that they don’t give Champagne a positive image.”
The union said conditions in the Champagne sector were in decline, with labor providers offering poor conditions and low wages as wine producers demanded cheap labor. But Blanco says the “Russian doll” system, in which “one company delegates to another,” makes it difficult to hold specific champagne houses accountable for worker exploitation.
In Kanoute’s case, neighbors called the police. The boss of a labor supplier, two of her agents, and one of the wine producers who used the supplier are now facing human trafficking charges for providing inadequate accommodation and non-existent or inadequate wages. He has been indicted. They are scheduled to appear in court in March.
IIn Epernay, staff at the Palace Cinema, which is located next to the train station, said workers who were sleeping poorly during the harvest season were a frequent problem, and the dozen or so people found this year were looking for a place out of the rain. said.
“It was so cold this year that I went home wondering if they were still alive in the morning,” Elise said. He said he worked at a movie theater for the past two years and saw minibuses dropping off workers every night. .
“Now they (the city) just want to transfer the workers because there are a lot of tourists coming here, but they should look for housing for them. It’s terrible. We asked the manager and asked the popcorn , Coke, and M&Ms, but I knew it wasn’t real food.”
A few kilometers outside Epernay, the Guardian met a group of Polish workers. They claimed to have worked 10 hours a day and their employment contracts showed they were being paid €11.40 an hour. This is below the legal minimum wage of €11.65 per hour before deductions. According to French law, workers must receive overtime pay of 25% per hour if they work more than 35 hours in a week, rising to 50% if they work more than 43 hours in a week. Masu.
Unions are calling on the industry to start adding labor considerations to the rules for what qualifies as champagne.
“When we condemn what happens in Champagne, it’s an omerta. Everyone is silent. Champagne has an image of being a party wine, a luxury. People don’t want to think about human trafficking allegations.” Blanco says.
In a statement to the Guardian, industry body the Champagne Commission said it called on public authorities to tighten controls and severely punish any wrongdoing.
“When we hear these terms (human trafficking) associated with our region, we are simply shocked. These shameful acts do not reflect the commitment of a passionate profession and we will never tolerance must be applied.”
This reminded wine producers that “using a service provider cannot be less costly than direct employment.” Low prices can be a sign of suspicious activity, so you should be on the lookout. ”
*Name has been changed
