The Brazil Labor Court on Friday ordered Volkswagen to pay 165 million Reais (approximately $ 30 million) in a rural ruling for collective moral damages after workers were subjected to slave conditions during the 1970s and 1980s. According to prosecutors, this is the greatest recovery of its kind in the country’s history, reports AP. Decades-old abuse revealed the investigation into the farm of Volkswagen’s subsidiary in Para State, in 2019 was initiated by the labor prosecutor’s office. The investigation was argued by extensive documentation provided by a local priest who has been tracing the matter for decades. After further inquiries and testimony testimony, Volkswagen was formally charged in 2024. The court accepted the charges that hundreds of workers were subject to the farm between 1974 and 1986 to the farm and log. The farm employed about 300 workers under irregular contracts to clean the forest and prepare pastures. They were monitored by armed guards and forced to stay on the farm under the debt. Unlike that, they allegedly received ‘unsafe housing and insufficient food’ needed for healthy survival. Workers who have gained diseases such as malaria received no medical care, AP said in a news release. The judgment of the court, Otavio Bruno da Silva Ferreira, confirmed that the farm belonged to Volkswagen and that the conditions comply with the legal definition of slave labor. “These practices form one of the greatest cases of exploitation of slave labor in the recent history of Brazil,” the labor prosecutor’s office said in a statement, quoted by AP. ‘Slavery is an’ current past ‘, because the points remain in Brazilian society, especially in labor relations,’ wrote Ferreira, adding that the understanding of this legacy is of the utmost importance to understand the current realities and to lead judgments against discrimination. Volkswagen to appeal the decision of the Brazilian headquarters of Volkswagen, after the verdict, released a statement, saying that it would appeal the court’s decision. The company argued that in his 72 years of operation in Brazil, it “continuously defended the principles of human dignity and strictly complied with all appropriate labor laws and regulations.” “Volkswagen again confirms its unwavering commitment to social responsibility, which is intrinsically linked to its behavior as a legal entity and employer,” said AP, referring to the company’s statement. Brazil has a history of more people from Africa than any other country, according to estimates of the Transatlantic Slave Database. It was the last country in the Western Hemisphere to abolish slavery in 1888.
Volkswagen stares historic fine of $ 30 million for ‘exploitation’ workers in the Amazon of Brazil in the face
