German and Polish unions cooperate over seasonal workers in agriculture

In August 2003, German and Polish trade unions organising in the agriculture sector - IG BAU and ZZPR - continued their long-running cooperation by jointly publishing a bilingual information booklet aimed at Polish seasonal workers in German agriculture. The publication aims to provide seasonal workers with a wide range of information on legal and trade union matters.

In August 2003, the German Trade Union for Building, Forestry, Agriculture and the Environment (Industriegewerkschaft Bauen-Agrar-Umwelt, IG BAU) and a Polish trade union representing employees in agriculture (Związek Zawodowy Pracowników Rolnictwa w Rzeczypospolitej Polskiej, ZZPR) jointly issued a bilingual information booklet aimed at Polish seasonal workers in Germany (Informacje dla pracowników sezonowych zatrudnionych w Niemczech/ Informationen für polnische Saisonarbeitskräfte in Deutschland). It contains information on a wide range of issues, such as: the basic legal provisions concerning the employment contract; employers' legal obligations concerning health insurance; the national social benefit system; legal entitlement to paid leave; regulations on pay and taxes; limitation periods concerning pay claims; the legal provisions for terminating a contract; and the legal minimum standards to be observed by employers concerning accommodation. The booklet gives advice on how the trade union can help its members in legal cases involving conflicts with the employer which may occur during the seasonal employment, and provides the addresses and phone numbers of regional trade union offices.

The booklet is designed for seasonal workers in all sectors but distribution is focused on the agriculture sector, where the bulk of seasonal employment is found. In 2002, the Central Employment Agency (Zentralstelle für Arbeitsvermittlung, ZAV) of the Federal Employment Service (Bundesanstalt für Arbeit, BA) registered about 300,000 seasonal employment contracts, of which 275,000 were in agriculture and forestry (the second most important sector is hotel and catering). Some 244,000 seasonal employment contracts in agriculture were concluded with workers from Poland (some workers may have more than one contract during a year). Seasonal employment is officially limited to 90 days per worker per year.

Seasonal work is a long established feature of German agriculture and, since the 1990s, when the numbers of Polish workers in agriculture increased, transnational cooperation has been established between IG BAU and ZZPR, which are both members of the European Federation of Trade Unions in Food, Agriculture, Tourism and Allied Branches (EFFAT). The new trade union booklet is the first of its kind for seasonal workers in Germany.

In 2003, IG BAU launched a new twice-yearly publication called L@ndworker which provides background information about working conditions in agriculture. The first issue, published in June, examined the situation of seasonal workers and highlighted the demands of IG BAU for: a minimum wage for seasonal workers of EUR 1,500 per month; a standard working week of 40 hours; regulations on Sunday and holiday work and overtime; and decent accommodation.