An investigation in Tuscany has found that three agricultural firms allegedly made hundreds of both Italian and foreign laborers work for up to 16 hours a day, paying them €2.50 per hour.
An inquiry by Italian Financial Police has found that hundreds of workers harvesting fruit and vegetables in Val di Cornia in the Tuscany region were forced to work for 15-16 hours a day, getting paid only €2.50 per hour. Most were employed on an undocumented and thus illegal basis, and allegedly found it difficult to get any days off - and those days were not paid.
The workers also said that they had suffered threats of being fired and verbal attacks. The three owners of the firms have been referred to the Livorno prosecutor's office for "illicit brokering and labor exploitation."
Investigation on between 2015 and 2019
Between 2015 and 2019, when an investigation began following tax checks, the three entrepreneurs committed "administrative violations in labor concerning 854 employment relations", according to a Financial Police statement. It added that 571 of the workers had been entirely "undocumented", while 283 had instead been registered in an inaccurate manner.
The owners of the firms, the Financial Police added, immediately paid the administrative sanctions put forward by the Financial Police and Italy's National Social Security Institute (INPS) as soon as they were informed of the legal proceedings. They added that the owners had paid €5.8 million.
Irregularities in the firms
Several of the workers, mostly foreign nationals, were made to live in an "illegally built cottage on the same land as the agricultural firm in poor hygienic conditions," without any heating and not hooked up to the water network. It also lacked drinking water.
The rent for the lodgings was taken out of the workers' earnings and was also undocumented: the estimated sanctions for this tax violation totals €150,000.
Tax violations have also been alleged for income of over €2 million, with non-payment of VAT and other taxes of about €600,000. Checks also covered funds the entrepreneurs had received from the EU through FEASR funds after they allegedly pretended to meet requirements.
With the complicity of a fourth firm, fake rental contracts were allegedly drawn up for agricultural land, thus leading to charges of fraud against the state and the EU of over €151,000 that were used to pay the laborers instead of for their intended purpose.
The resulting damage to the country's coffers has been reported to the Tuscan prosecutor's office of the Audits Court.