Exploitation in a bottle at star’s Tuscan vineyard
A rolling Tuscan estate converted by the musician Sting into a paradise of vineyards and olive groves has been caught up in a police investigation after underpaid refugees were discovered picking grapes there.
Italian police investigating a gang that sent migrants, refugees and asylum seekers to work in what prosecutors describe as ‘‘inhumane and slave-like’’ conditions in Tuscany found they had been harvesting grapes at the Il Palagio estate, where Sting produces award-winning wines.
‘‘Sting was out of the country at the time and knew nothing about this,’’ said Antonio Sangermano, a prosecutor.
He said no-one working on the estate was under investigation.
The discovery comes as Sting – a long-time supporter of Amnesty International – gets ready to release a new album next month, which he has said will be inspired by Europe’s migrant crisis.
The musician bought the 16thcentury estate from a Tuscan noble in 1999, building it up through land purchases to over 360 hectares and selling his own olives, wine, honey and salami from a farm shop. This year he was named as one of Italy’s top 100 wine producers by industry bible Wine Spectator, thanks to reds with names like Message in a Bottle and Sister Moon, which his website describes as tasting of ‘‘sweet cherries, crushed flowers and licorice’’.
Investigators stumbled on to the use of illegal labour on the estate while investigating another Tuscan wine producer, Coli, which allegedly teamed with a Pakistani man, Tariq Sikander, to recruit hundreds of migrants to pick its own grapes for as little as €4 (NZ$6) an hour. Asylum seekers in Italy are not allowed to work.
‘‘They were working in the winter wearing flip-flops – it was slave-like and inhumane, and had been going on for five years,’’ claimed Sangermano.
One picker who was cut badly while working was taken to hospital, where his wound was passed off as a ‘‘domestic incident’’.
Thirteen people are now under investigation for running the alleged gang, five of whom have been placed under house arrest after Sikander agreed to give evidence to the police.
Prosecutors believe Sikander sent up to 40 migrants to pick grapes at Sting’s estate last year without his knowledge.
Sting said: ‘‘I am saddened and distressed to learn that an independent company leasing some of our fields may have been involved in questionable labour practices. I fully expect Italian law will take its course and bring the matter to court.’’
While Sting has been winning plaudits for his biodynamic wines, made from grapes grown in earth mixed with cow dung, Coli is being investigated for illicitly mixing its Tuscan grapes with cheaper grapes from southern Italy. Managers are also accused of trying to persuade Sikander not to give evidence against them.
A spokeswoman for Coli declined to comment.
The crackdown on illegal, lowpaid labour in Tuscany shows that a practice perfected in the Italian fruit and vegetable business is now spreading to the country’s vineyards. Tens of thousands of migrants pick fruit and vegetables in miserable conditions in the south of Italy, living in squalid camps where they are mistreated by gang bosses.
Sting said he hoped that the publicity generated by the case ‘‘will shine a necessary spotlight on unacceptable labour practices in the wine industry’’.