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DE RUEHDG #0547/01 1321740
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
P 121740Z MAY 09
FM AMEMBASSY SANTO DOMINGO
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC PRIORITY 2748
INFO RUEHZA/WHA CENTRAL AMERICAN COLLECTIVE PRIORITY
RUEHWN/AMEMBASSY BRIDGETOWN PRIORITY 2246
RUEHCV/AMEMBASSY CARACAS PRIORITY 0997
RUEHGE/AMEMBASSY GEORGETOWN PRIORITY 1156
RUEHKG/AMEMBASSY KINGSTON PRIORITY 2945
RUEHLP/AMEMBASSY LA PAZ MAY 0564
RUEHPO/AMEMBASSY PARAMARIBO PRIORITY 1280
RUEHPU/AMEMBASSY PORT AU PRINCE PRIORITY 4992
RUEHSP/AMEMBASSY PORT OF SPAIN PRIORITY 1985
RUEHUB/USINT HAVANA PRIORITY 0266

UNCLAS SANTO DOMINGO 000547 
 
SENSITIVE 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR WHA/CAR, LA PAZ FOR A/DCM C LAMBERT 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREL PHUM PGOV HA DR
SUBJECT: PRESENT LABOR CONDITIONS RELATED TO FORCED LABOR 
IN SUGAR PRODUCTION 
 
¶1. (SBU) Summary: This cable reports on current labor 
conditions evaluated to help determine whether the production 
of sugar in the Dominican Republic is accomplished through 
forced labor.  Post individually consulted ten groups with 
significant experience working in the sugar bateyes.  The 
responses from these groups negated reports of forced labor 
and the conditions supporting the same.  Aside from armed 
guards, a cultural norm in country, only a few groups 
reported isolated incidents of some of the practices cited by 
sources provided to the Department of Labor.  Post therefore 
continues to recommend that the Department of Labor not 
include Dominican sugar in its list of goods produced through 
forced labor. 
 
THE SURVEY 
---------- 
 
¶3. (U) The survey Post used to solicit responses from NGOs, 
inter-governmental agencies and other humanitarian 
organizations is as follows: 
We are attempting to gauge current work freedom situations 
for cane laborers and would like to know if, in your 
experience, any of the following are still occurring.  If 
they are not occurring now, but did occur in the past, do you 
know approximately when the practices stopped? 
(a) Withholding wages until the end of the harvest or the 
beginning of the following season to keep workers in the 
field. 
(b) Confiscating workers' clothes and documents to prevent 
them from leaving. 
(c) Presence of armed guards in the fields.  If they are 
there, why are they present? 
(d) Punishing with violence workers who are caught trying to 
leave. 
(e) Threatening those who try to leave with forced 
deportation (due to their lack of documentation). 
(f) Falsely promising employment in other sectors to workers 
who are then forced to work in sugarcane for no wages or for 
wages so low that they cannot leave. 
(g) Paying the workers in coupons or vouchers that are only 
honored on company grounds rather than in currency. 
 
THE RESPONSES 
------------- 
 
¶4. (SBU) Post solicited responses to these questions from 
representatives with Movimiento Socio Cultural para los 
Trabajadores Haitianos (MOSCTHA), the Solidarity Center 
(AFL-CIO), Catholic Relief Services (CRS), Movimiento de 
Mujeres Dominico-Haitianas (MUDHA), Pan American Development 
Foundation (PADF), Mujeres en Desarrollo Dominicana (MUDE), 
Batey Relief Alliance Dominicana (BRA), Servicio Jesuitas a 
Refugiadas y Migrantes (SJRM), Centro Dominicano de Asesoria 
e Investigaciones Legales (CEDAIL), and Facultad 
Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales (FLACSO).  These groups 
represent a highly reputable cross-section of the community 
working in bateyes with Haitian sugarcane laborers and their 
descendents in the Dominican Republic. 
 
¶5. (U) Withholding wages until the end of the harvest or the 
beginning of the following season to keep workers in the 
field.  None of the ten groups questioned know of cases in 
which this practice is occurring.  Two mentioned that this 
was a past practice, but were not sure how long ago the 
practice stopped. 
 
¶6. (U) Confiscating workers' clothes and documents to prevent 
them from leaving.  Only one group reported that this 
practice still occurs with the confiscation of documents, but 
not clothes.  The one respondent that claimed this was still 
occurring based her response on information received from a 
batey union in Barahona.  When PolOff contacted the head of 
the union from whom the group's director based her response, 
that union representative stated that this does not occur. 
Two other sources claimed that this was an ancient practice 
that has long since ceased. 
 
¶7. (U) Presence of armed guards in the fields.  If they are 
there, why are they present?  Five out of ten groups report 
 
that this practice continues.  Of those reporting that this 
practice exists, all reported that the guards are present for 
the security of the workers and the owner's property.  Two of 
the respondents believed that they have the effect of keeping 
the people down and intimidating the workers into not 
complaining about their conditions.  One respondent, who said 
that the guards are currently present to maintain order noted 
that 15 years ago, the guards were used to keep the workers 
in their camps and to bring in new workers.  This source 
commented that the guards no longer hold this function.  One 
respondent noted that the guards are not in place to keep the 
workers from leaving, in fact workers routinely leave one 
batey for another, but rather to keep order in a field full 
of men armed with machetes. 
 
¶8. (U) Punishing with violence workers who are caught trying 
to leave.  Nine out of ten groups report no known cases of 
this practice.  One group representative reported that he had 
heard of a few cases of this practice, but noted that it has 
been reduced significantly in recent years.  Two respondents 
who said the practice had ceased claimed that it had stopped 
some time ago. 
 
¶9. (U) Threatening those who try to leave with forced 
deportation (due to their lack of documentation).  Five out 
of ten groups report no known cases of this practice, and no 
sources noted a threat of deportation in response to an 
attempt to leave the bateyes.  Of those five groups reporting 
that threats of deportation exist, one was contradicted by 
her source who works with her in Barahona.  Of the remaining 
four groups claiming that threats of deportation continues, 
two stated that the threat arises when the workers complain 
about their salary or ask for better working conditions, not 
when they seek to leave.  One representative who believes the 
practice occurs in response to requests to improve conditions 
claimed that some leaders of worker groups have been deported 
after seeking improvements.  Another representative noted 
that generally workers have a fear of deportation gained 
through the process of their migration even if the threat of 
deportation is not raised by their employers. 
 
¶10. (U) Falsely promising employment in other sectors to 
workers who are then forced to work in sugarcane for no wages 
or for wages so low that they cannot leave.  Six out of ten 
groups report no known cases of this practice, and no groups 
agreed with the second part of the question - i.e. that 
workers are forced to work in sugarcane for no wages or for 
wages so low that they cannot leave.  Of those reporting that 
this practice exists, all four claimed that the workers 
expected to make more money than they made upon beginning 
work in the bateyes.  Two of those respondents claimed that 
workers are promised jobs in construction by "buscones," but 
the workers ended up in bateyes. 
 
¶11. (U) Paying the workers in coupons or vouchers that are 
only honored on company grounds rather than in currency.  Six 
out of ten groups report no known cases of this practice.  On 
the four who claimed knowledge of this event, one was 
contradicted by her source.  Of those remaining, one claimed 
that this practice was continuing until last year in 
Barahona; however, these are not company store coupons in the 
traditional sense, but rather paper slips that can be 
converted to cash (like any other paycheck) or used in 
company stores.  When PolOff asked those reporting that this 
practice exists to further explain what they knew to be 
happening, the groups explained that the coupons can be 
exchanged for cash, but not until payday.  When the workers 
deliver the cut sugarcane, they are given a "coupon" that 
notes how much the cane weighed and how much they will be 
paid on payday.  Because the workers in some bateyes are paid 
every two to three weeks, they may need to wait as much as 20 
days to collect their pay in cash.  If the worker decides not 
to wait for this payment, he or she can submit these sheets 
of paper to company-owned stores where they are paid 80 cents 
on the dollar for immediate use.  All groups to whom PolOff 
requested additional information stated that the workers are 
able to collect the full amount of their salary in cash if 
they can wait until payday to collect their money. 
 
COMMENT 
------- 
 
¶12. (SBU) Based on these responses, and the combined 
experience of the political officers serving at Post, Post 
concludes that the practices and conditions supporting a 
finding of forced labor in the production of Dominican sugar 
do not currently exist and suggests that the Department of 
Labor not include Dominican sugar in its List of Goods as 
produced through forced labor.  The results of this survey 
are particularly significant given that, with possible 
exception of PADF, the groups questioned represent and work 
solely in the interest of the Haitian laborers and their 
descendents.  Also noteworthy is the fact that although 
Post's labor and human rights reporting officer daily 
communicates with and responds to grievances from NGOs 
representing Haitian rights, the practices leading to this 
survey have never previously been raised as concerns. 
Likewise, in PolOff's personal experience speaking with and 
visiting the laborers and residents of bateyes throughout the 
Dominicain Republic, with the exception of one armed guard 
seen on one batey, the issues raised in this survey are not 
current practice. 
 
¶13. (SBU) Haitian workers' lack of documentation and illegal 
status in the country does place them in a tenuous situation. 
 There is a high likelihod that their employers take 
advantage of their situation and this is reflected through 
their payment and working conditions.  Likewise, the presence 
of armed guards on private batey property is not surprising 
-- culturally, this is standard practice and many private 
property owners employ armed guards due to the high crime 
rate in the country and concerns for personal protection. 
Batey workers routinely leave one batey for another, or from 
bateyes to other cities for work, and no respondent reported 
guards or other batey representatives attempting to stop this 
movement. 
 
(U) Please visit us at 
http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/wha/santodomingo/  
BULLEN