The restructuring of Italian agriculture and its impact upon capital–labour relations: Labour contracting and exploitation in the fresh fruit and vegetable supply chain of the Lazio Region, Central Italy (original) (raw)

Labour contracting is anywhere on the rise globally, even in fully developed capitalist countries. Far from being an anomaly in the smooth everyday functioning of the economy, contractors are a crucial node in facilitating and ensuring global capital's control over local labour regimes. This article uses a global value chain perspective to investigate the re-emergence of gangmasters and gang labour in the agricultural sector of Lazio, Central Italy. It analyses the fruit and vegetable supply chain formation and configuration in the Lazio Region with the aim of identifying the underlying processes leading to the creation of gangmasters by capital to have a cheap and disposable, especially migrant, labour force. It also intends to give a more nuanced understanding of labour contracting in this context. K E Y W O R D S agricultural labour, Central Italy, fresh fruit and vegetable production, labour contracting, value chains 1 | INTRODUCTION This article investigates the restructuring and reorganization of fresh fruit and vegetable (FFV) production in central Italy and its impact upon producers and capital-labour relations. Within the framework of a global value chain (GVC) perspective, it analyses the FFV supply chain formation and configuration in the Lazio Region by looking at the main