this post was submitted on 29 Jan 2024
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Prisoners in the US are part of a hidden workforce linked to hundreds of popular food brands

Unmarked trucks packed with prison-raised cattle roll out of the Louisiana State Penitentiary, where men are sentenced to hard labor and forced to work, for pennies an hour or sometimes nothing at all. After rumbling down a country road to an auction house, the cows are bought by a local rancher and then followed by The Associated Press another 600 miles to a Texas slaughterhouse that feeds into the supply chains of giants like McDonald’s, Walmart and Cargill..

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[–] autotldr 1 points 2 years ago

This is the best summary I could come up with:


The goods these prisoners produce wind up in the supply chains of a dizzying array of products found in most American kitchens, from Frosted Flakes cereal and Ball Park hot dogs to Gold Medal flour, Coca-Cola and Riceland rice.

The AP sifted through thousands of pages of documents and spoke to more than 80 current or formerly incarcerated people, including men and women convicted of crimes that ranged from murder to shoplifting, writing bad checks, theft or other illegal acts linked to drug use.

Mammoth commodity traders that are essential to feeding the globe like Cargill, Bunge, Louis Dreyfus, Archer Daniels Midland and Consolidated Grain and Barge – which together post annual revenues of more than $400 billion – have in recent years scooped up millions of dollars’ worth of soy, corn and wheat straight from prisons, which compete with local farmers.

Pastorick said the department has transformed Angola from “the bloodiest prison in America” over the past several decades with “large-scale criminal justice reforms and reinvestment into the creation of rehabilitation, vocational and educational programs designed to help individuals better themselves and successfully return to communities.” He noted that pay rates are set by state statute.

In March 2020, though all other outside company jobs were halted, the Arizona corrections department announced about 140 women were being abruptly moved from their prison to a metal hangar-like warehouse on property owned by Hickman’s Family Farms, which pitches itself as the Southwest’s largest egg producer.

Though the company has since stopped using them, in recent years they were hired in Arizona by Taylor Farms, which sells salad kits in many major grocery stores nationwide and supplies popular fast-food chains and restaurants like Chipotle Mexican Grill.


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