With Melquíades de Araújo

Minerva: The great exporter is also a great exploiter

The Minerva Group -which just expanded its activities to Uruguay and is getting ready to operate in Paraguay- has been paying its workers in Brazil well below the average wage. Workers are not putting up with this anymore and are fully mobilized. Sirel interviewed the president of the Federation of Food Industry Workers of São Paulo (FETIASP), Melquíades de Araújo, about the situation.

-How is the conflict at Frigorífico Minerva in Barretos going?

-Bargaining on wage and working conditions for workers in our industry in the state of São Paulo are normally held in May, but this particular meatpacking plant scheduled it’s own negotiations for the month of December. The reason it did this is that it pays much lower salaries than the other companies in the sector and is using this mechanism of individual bargaining to get away with it. 

It’s particularly significant that Minerva CEO Edivar Vilela de Queiroz is, at the same time, the president of the Union of Meatpacking Industries of the State of São Paulo (SINDFRIO).

The Minerva Workers’ Union has been struggling for a long time to schedule its negotiations to coincide with those in the rest of the state, but this company has been avoiding that option because it knows full well that it would have to significantly raise its workers’ salaries and improve their working conditions to get in line with industry levels.

-Is that the reason why no agreement was reached in December…

-Exactly. And now we are in February and discussions are focusing on three issues: rescheduling negotiations to May; paying workers a share of the profits similar to that paid by the rest of the companies in the state; and establishing the same wage floor as the rest of the industry.

-How many plants does Minerva have?

-It owns eight production units and is in the process of building another one, but the bulk of its operations is concentrated in Barretos, here in São Paulo, and that’s where they strive to keep their negotiations separate from the other companies in the state.

In order to bring its wages up to par with São Paulo companies Minerva would have to grant its workers a 30 percent wage increase, as annual inflation is only 4.5 percent. That means that the wages it pays its workers are well below the average paid in the industry.

-What exactly are Minerva workers demanding?  

-They’re asking for a minimum wage floor of 401 US dollars a month, US$ 168 share in the company’s profits, and a basic food basket worth US$ 50. But the company is refusing to grant even these modest demands.  

-What is the wage floor in other companies in the state?  

-Some US$ 450, but the vast majority of the workers earn much more than that.

-What do you think of Minerva’s spending US$ 65 million to buy one of the largest meatpacking companies in Uruguay while it exploits its workers in Brazil?

-Minerva is a great exporter, but it’s also a great exploiter, because it refuses to grant a wage floor that is practically Brazil’s minimum wage.

The workers have held two assemblies already, which resulted in two-hour work stoppages each, and Minerva still won’t budge. You have to realize that it intends to do the same thing in Uruguay. It’s going to implement an identical policy of low wages at the meatpacking plant it purchased there.

-What do the workers plan to do next?

-The union has already filed a complaint with the Labor Court demanding that Minerva’s basic agreements be adjusted so that they match agreements in the rest of the state. But the court can take up to a year to grant a hearing.

To speed up this process, they will need to stage a strike and stop all activity at the plant, because that’s the only way the court will issue a decision quickly. This may be what the union is planning right now.

As for us, we’re trying to pressure Minerva, to help the workers reach a solution without having to wait for the court’s decision. But so far the company has refused to yield.

Maybe it thinks the workers aren’t capable of paralyzing the plant. But it’s playing with fire.