BOGOTA (TrustLaw) As the workload in the flower fields increased in the lead-up to

Valentines Day, so did the pain in a 32-year-old female workers right hand. The worker,
who asked to be identified only as Juanita for fear of losing her job, approached her
employer.
He said, No, Mamacita, youre fine. If you are sick you are considered incapable and you
get fired. So Ive become conditioned to work in pain, she said.
Juanita, a mother of two, works about an hour outside of Bogot, amidst green valleys that
receive regular rainfall and 12 hours of sunlight every day, due to the capital citys proximity
to the equator. The conditions are prime for flower cultivation.
After Holland, Colombia is the worlds second largest exporter of flowers, nearly 60 percent
of will reach the United States, according to Corporacin Cactus, a Bogot-based nongovernmental organization that supports the rights of women working in the flower export
industry.
Colombias growing flower industry yielded $1.24 billion in sales in 2010, up from $966
million in 2006. Its the only industry in the country dominated by female workers, who
constitute about 65 percent of the approximate 100,000-person workforce.
But Colombias nearly 50-year-long civil armed conflict fuelled by both communist
guerrilla groups like the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, known as the FARC, and
insurgent, right-wing successor paramilitary groups has contributed to precarious labor
conditions.
Colombian President Juan Manuel Santos announced Tuesday, Sept. 4, that the government
would sit down for peace talks with the FARC in mid-October, first in Oslo, and then in
Havana. But on Sept. 7, according to media reports, Santos rejected the FARCs proposal for
an immediate ceasefire until a final peace accord is established.
Colombia is considered to be the most dangerous country in the world for trade unionists.
About 55 percent of trade union deaths between 2001 and 2010 took place in this South
American country, according to the International Trade Union Confederation.
Theres an atmosphere in Colombia, and in the floriculture industry, where being a unionist
is similar to being a guerrilla fighter, or a terrorist, explained Aura Rodriguez, president of
Corporacin Cactus. If you are a unionist you will be treated with suspicion, at the very
least.
About 12 percent of Colombias flower workers are unionized. But about less than one
percent of those unions are thought to be independent, as opposed to company-controlled.
Groups like Corporacin Cactus say that as the flower industry in Colombia expands, its
female workers specific vulnerability to labor rights abuses is worsening.

The industry is profiting more and more and the level of production has not changed, but
weve effectively seen a reduction of 24,000 workers over the last five years, Rodriguez
said.
Because the majority of the women here are heads of their families, they need the work
that makes them more open to exploitation.
Corporacin Cactus handles about 200 legal cases a year, including claims of unjust
dismissals because of pregnancies and on-the-job injuries.
Flower workers complaints also stem from health problems. According to Oxfam Colombia,
medical surveys show that two-thirds of Colombias flower workers suffer from problems
ranging from nausea to miscarriages, all related to pesticide exposure.
On a Sunday afternoon this past summer, four flower workers gathered on their day off in a
squat, cement building in Tocancipa, one of the main flower cultivation towns outside of
Bogot. Corporacin Cactus lawyer Omaira Paez took notes on the workers health cases and
later commented on the nearly empty room, speckled with plastic chairs.
People are afraid to come and meet with us, she said.
One of the workers at the meeting, Yolanda Castaneda, 41, arrived late with her six-year-old
daughter. She had fallen on her knee while pruning flowers in January 2011. After that, she
said, both her co-workers and employers had taunted her, saying her work performance was
sub-par. She was fired last June.
Castenada told TrustLaw she planned to fight to get reclaim her job and regain her
approximate $280 minimum monthly wage.
They fired me unjustly because they did not want to have someone who is injured working,
because that person cant do the same job like the other people can do, Castenada said.
Castenadas Colombian-based former employer, Exotic Farms, is among several companies
that denied interview requests from TrustLaw.
Exotic Farms, like the majority of both Colombian-owned and foreign-managed flower
companies, does not employ union workers.
There are only two independent trade unions within the flower industry. Thats a dramatic
decrease from the approximate 15 independent unions that existed in 2011, according to
Lydia Lpez, president of the independent union Untraflores.
Untraflores has 2,500 affiliates, but only 42 people the majority of whom are women at
Lpezs company report their union membership.
She says she feels pressure from some co-workers and employers alike, but has not received
any threats.

Being a union member, a union leader, changes things a little bit, said Lopez, 43, the head
of her family. I dont know all of my rights, but I feel proud that I do help make a
difference.
Union members and affiliates are more likely to retain their contracts when they suffer onthe-job injuries, illness or become pregnant, said Lopez.
But they still remain susceptible to an abrasive political culture, said Nora Maldonado, the
former secretary of a union called Sintrasplendor.
Sintrasplendor was operating out of a company called Splendor Flowers up until January
2011, when Splendor Flowers tried to contract out all 350 union members to a different
flower company. A subsequent six-month strike resulted in the disbanding of both the union,
and eventually, the liquidation of the stagnant company.
Maldonado hasnt been able to find a job in the flower industry since and now works as a
storekeeper, earning less than minimum wage.
Juanita, the unrepresented, injured flower worker, is unlikely to turn to a union for support in
gaining sick leave or medical compensation for her injury. She didnt know what the term
union meant and asked for it to be explained.