(Credit: Riddhi Setty)
Sugarcane producers in Guatemala are pushing for more women to join their workforce to compensate for migrating men. This could put these women at risk for a dangerous heat-related disease.
In a recent study in The Journal of Climate Change and Health, a team reported that nearly half the women sugarcane seeders studied in the fields of Pantaleon suffered from reduced kidney function, and many suffered dehydration. These sugarcane seeders are cultivating the pants that become the sugar used across the globe, including in the U.S. The findings suggest to the researchers, and to some others, that protective labor policies need to include women.
“Women should be afforded the same interventions that the men are,” said Jason Glaser, CEO of La Isla, an organization dedicated to ending heat-related illnesses among workers. “And it doesn’t look like in this project that that’s happening.”
The disease itself isn’t new. Across Latin America, thousands of young men have died from chronic kidney disease for decades. The causes of this disease have long been a mystery, with researchers pointing to dehydration, heat stress, pesticides and pre-existing conditions as contributing factors.
Migration isn’t new either, but research indicates that migration driven by climate change is increasing, driving men to leave agricultural communities in Guatemala in dry seasons. Women often stay behind to take care of their families. This shift has left industries like sugarcane—a major agricultural sector—short staffed.
“When the husband is missing, someone else needs to run agriculture,” said Stephanie Leder, an associate professor at the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences and an expert on climate out-migration, who wasn’t involved in the study.
As a result, companies like Pantaleon – Central America’s top sugarcane producer, which produces sugar bound for the U.S. among other countries – have been hiring more women to be seeders, to cut and plant the sugarcane. The new study was funded by Pantaleon and the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences; Pantaleon had no role in analyzing or interpreting the data, according to the study.
Between 2021 and 2023, across two harvest seasons, 14 researchers interviewed 22 women about their overall health and monitored them in six sessions, with each session including a day that the women were working in the fields and a day that they had off.
The researchers outfitted them with vests equipped with air sensors which collected samples of particulate matter, and with small wireless iButtons to monitor heat exposure. They gave them questionnaires asking about heat symptoms and health habits.
Researchers noted a decline in kidney health in 45% of the women being observed during the course of the study, possibly because of increasingly hot temperatures.
Most workers who participated in the study had never been to a clinic before, and really liked receiving their results, Butler-Dawson said. The company’s doctors explained what their results meant and how to reduce their blood pressure if needed.
Unlike men, on their off days, women were doing household chores and cooking, said Laura Calvimontes Barrientos, a field researcher on the study whose job was to talk to the women.
“We are dealing with a population that is heavily understudied,” she said. “I don’t think we have yet characterized all the off-work burdens that are placed on female workers.”
The study suggests that heat has a greater impact on women because they sweat less than men and have higher body fat percentage and metabolic rates.
However, David Wegman, a professor at the University of Massachusetts College of Health Sciences who has conducted studies on kidney health in sugarcane workers in El Salvador and Nicaragua, disagrees that this disease affects women more.
“The differences are not as dramatic as one might think, or as the article might suggest they are,” said Wegman, who is part of a La Isla team conducting research on the same Pantaleon sugarcane plantation in Guatemala. “What we have found with the women is that they are less affected than the men, but we believe [that is] because they are better at pacing themselves.”
Kidney disease in agricultural workers has been long documented, and concern around this issue is increasing. Experts like Wegman said working in high heat plays a significant role. It is part of the reason that Pantaleon has an interest in improving working conditions and screens workers for kidney disease before hiring them, he said.
Butler-Dawson said that researchers have focused mostly on the working conditions of men in sugarcane fields to date. “Now they need to turn their focus to other types of field work, like the seeders and the women,” Butler-Dawson said.
The study also surveyed 10 additional women Pantaleon workers about facilities. All the women said they had access to toilets and they drank water when they felt thirsty. But nine women said they would drink more if they had better access to toilets.
Calvimontes Barrientos said this might be because at times the portable toilets are further away from where they’re stationed.
Researchers conducting studies monitoring kidney function in the fields of Pantaleon say more comprehensive occupational protections need to be put in place for these workers.
Glaser said that the big picture questions are: “What does this mean for families that are single-parent effectively, because of migration? What does this mean for society?”
He added, “And now, if the women are also going to get sick at similar levels as the men—this is a great concern.”
About the author(s)
Riddhi Setty is a Stabile investigative fellow at Columbia Journalism School. She previously reported for Bloomberg Law as a labor reporter.