The Bitter Work Behind Sugar
Reveal
The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX
4.7 • 8K Ratings
🗓️ 3 December 2022
⏱️ 52 minutes
🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
Sugar is a big part of Americans’ daily diet, but we rarely ask where that sweet cane comes from.
In November, the United States announced that it will block all imports of raw sugar from one of those sources: the cane fields owned by the Central Romana Corp. in the Dominican Republic. U.S. Customs and Border Protection cited labor abuses in its decision. Sugar from Central Romana feeds into the supply chains of major U.S. brands, including Domino and Hershey.
The federal government’s action follows a two-year investigation by Reveal and Mother Jones. Reporters Sandy Tolan and Euclides Cordero Nuel visited Haitian migrants in the Dominican Republic who do the backbreaking work of cutting sugarcane for little pay. Central Romana is the Dominican Republic’s largest private employer and has strong links to two powerful Florida businessmen, Alfonso and Pepe Fanjul. The reporters speak to workers who have no access to government pensions, so they’re forced to work in the fields into their 80s for as little as $3 a day. In the 1990s, Tolan reported on human trafficking and child labor in the Dominican sugar industry. Conditions improved following pressure on the government from local activists, human rights groups and the U.S. Labor Department. But major problems have persisted.
After Reveal’s story first aired in fall 2021, Congress took action. Fifteen members of the House Ways and Means Committee called on federal agencies to formulate a plan to address what they called the “slave-like conditions” in the Dominican cane fields. Central Romana also took action: It bulldozed one of the worker camps our reporters visited, claiming it was part of an improvement program. Residents say that with very little warning, they were told to pack up their lives. Central Romana denies the U.S. government’s recent findings that its cane cutters are working under forced labor conditions.
This is an update of an episode that originally aired in September 2021.
Support Reveal’s journalism at Revealnews.org/donatenow
Subscribe to our weekly newsletter to get the scoop on new episodes at Revealnews.org/weekly
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | Hey, it's Alan. Thanks for listening. But have you been watching? You know, |
| 0:05.0 | Reveal also makes documentaries. We recently premiered the Grab at the Toronto |
| 0:10.2 | International Film Festival. The Grab documentary uncovers a secret power play |
| 0:15.8 | by multinational corporations and wealthy governments to grab as much food and |
| 0:21.2 | water now before there's not enough to go around. Reveal reporter Nate |
| 0:25.9 | Halverson and his team spent nearly seven years investigating this phenomenon |
| 0:31.1 | across five continents to support the show and the independent films that |
| 0:36.2 | expose injustice and help change laws and lives. Please donate to Reveal by |
| 0:41.3 | December 31st. Just visit revealnews.org slash 2023. Again to support what we |
| 0:47.6 | do, go to revealnews.org slash 2023. Thank you. |
| 1:03.5 | From the Center for Investigative Reporting in PRX, this is reveal. I'm Al Etz. |
| 1:10.5 | This past July and Baltimore amid fireworks and patriotic music, workers |
| 1:22.3 | relit the famous Domino Sugar sign which was under repair. For decades, this |
| 1:28.8 | icon has cast a red glow over the cities in a harbor. You can see it from miles |
| 1:34.4 | away. Each year, Domino produces millions of pounds of refined sugar for |
| 1:41.2 | candy makers and supermarkets. But if you look at their packaging, it doesn't |
| 1:46.2 | say exactly where that processed sugar originates. Some of it comes from |
| 1:51.6 | cane grown in the US, Brazil and Mexico are also big suppliers. Then there's |
| 1:57.6 | the Dominican Republic. We're still today on vast plantations. Sugar cane is |
| 2:03.0 | cut by men with machetes and hauled away by ox drawn carts. The work is |
| 2:11.3 | grueling. The conditions harsh. Recently hundreds of workers protested in the |
| 2:20.8 | Dominican capital Santo Domingo. They chanted without cane cutters, there is no sugar. |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of The Center for Investigative Reporting and PRX and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2025.