Champagne ‘harvest of shame treated workers like slaves'
At least 14 champagne houses used grapes picked by illegal immigrants deprived of food, housed in insalubrious conditions and treated like slaves, a court has heard.
One of the pickers said that even animals enjoyed better conditions. The claims aired at a trial which revealed what critics claim are the sordid secrets of the eastern French region that produces the world's most famous sparkling wine.
Behind the glamorous image of champagne lies a widespread reality of exploitation and misery, unions said, as they held a protest outside the criminal court in Châlons-en-Champagne.
The court heard the cases of the manager and two deputies at an agency that employed pickers and supplied grapes to firms in the Champagne region. They are accused of human trafficking in connection with 57 African migrants and face up to seven years in prison if found guilty.
A French firm that used the agency's services and which itself supplied grapes to champagne houses was also on trial for having recourse to unauthorised workers. The 'harvest of shame', as it has been called, was revealed in 2023 when work inspectors were called to a shed that was housing dozens of grape pickers.
Almost all were illegal immigrants from west Africa, living in makeshift camps in Paris, when they were recruited by the Anavim agency with a promise of earning €250 a week, the court heard.
In practice none earned that amount and many were not paid anything at all. They were forced to sleep between ten and 15 to a room, using inflatable mattresses on gravel-covered ground. There were no showers and three toilets for them, which were blocked when inspectors arrived.
They worked from 6am to 8pm, received little water and only two meals a day — sandwiches — and were so hungry that some ate the grapes off the vines or potatoes found in neighbouring fields for sustenance, the court heard. When they complained, foremen threatened them with knives and tear gas.
Djakaniyaou Kanoute, 44, said: 'I never thought that the people who make champagne would house us in a place where animals would not feel good. Everything was dirty. We couldn't wash and when we wanted to cook rice, we had to start a fire with wood because there was not even a camping stove.'
Doumbia Mamadou, 45, from the Ivory Coast, said: 'We were badly treated, we didn't eat. We couldn't say anything. In short, we were treated like slaves.' In an interview with L'Est Éclair, the regional newspaper, he said: 'We still haven't received a single cent for all the work we did. What we experienced was really horrible. Frankly, it traumatised us. Now we want justice.'
The court heard that illustrious champagne houses used subcontractors to provide grapes from the region's vineyards. The subcontractors in turn used agencies like Anavim which offered cut-price picking services.
A representative of Cerseuillat de la Gravelle, the subcontractor, told the court it picked grapes for local vineyard owners but also for merchants and champagne houses. He said 14 champagne houses were among its clients. Cerseuillat de la Gravelle is on trial as a legal entity, but not its directors or employees as individual defendants. It denies wrongdoing.
Svetlana Goumina, 44, from Kyrgyzstan, the manager of Anavim, said she did not know which champagne houses had used grapes picked by the migrants she employed.
Goumina denies the charge of human trafficking, as do the two co-defendants.
Prosecutors said that Anavim sold grapes for €0.45 per kilo to Cerseuillat de la Gravelle, which sold them on for up to €0.60 per kilo. The standard market price in the region in 2023 was €6.35 per kilo.
Maître Maxime Cessieux, a lawyer for the migrant workers, said they had been treated with 'total scorn for human dignity'. He called on champagne houses to stop 'pretending they did not know' of the conditions inflicted on pickers. The trial continues. It was scheduled to end late on Thursday.
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