Tata Shoshiashvili, Jaba Chachanidze, OC Media, October 2021
Thirty-year-old veteran Jaba Chachanidze joined a temporary farm worker program jointly organised by the German and Georgian governments. When he arrived, he found nothing but backbreaking labour, squalor, and returned with less than 10% of the money he was promised…
At first I went to strawberry plantations near Stuttgart. I was shocked after I realized whatās happening ā the living and working conditions were absolutely different from what Georgia promised us.
When I arrived, my employer said that I had to earn a salary at a completely different rate and all of us were charged additional taxes…
Added to that I had to pay ā¬150 for āhousingā per month, when in fact it consisted of two interconnected containers in which 24 of us, workers from Georgia, lived…
I immediately took a video of our living conditions and sent it to the Employment Agency of Georgia and the Embassy of Georgia. They asked me for a detailed letter and to send photos. After that there was no response.
When I was working at the first farm and contacted journalists, my employer told me, āYou will be fired if you continue to spread false informationā…
A month and a week after arriving in Stuttgart I made about ā¬300 but in the end, my employer gave me only ā¬100. He said that we had to pay him for everything: for dinner, which he gave us once a day; for living in his containers, which he called a āhouseā; after we came to Germany we would ride a bus to the farm, so each of us had to pay ā¬35 for it. So instead of the promised ā¬1300, I earned ā¬100…
Recent Comments