US rejects Dominican sugar tied to forced labor

SAN JUAN, Puerto Rico — The U.S. government announced Wednesday that it will detain all imports of sugar and related products made in the Dominican Republic by Central Romana Corporation, Ltd. amid allegations that it uses forced labor.

A U.S. Customs and Border Protection investigation found that the company allegedly isolated workers, withheld wages, fostered abusive working and living conditions and pushed for excessive overtime, the agency said in a news release.

“Manufacturers like Central Romana, who fail to abide by our laws, will face consequences as we root out these inhumane practices from U.S. supply chains,” said AnnMarie Highsmith with the CBP’s Office of Trade.

Central Romana said in a written response to The Associated Press that it received the news about the import ban with “great astonishment.”

Central Romana, which has long faced those types of accusations, is the Dominican Republic’s largest sugar producer in an industry that exports more than $100 million worth of products to the U.S. every year.

One of its owners is Florida-based Fanjul Corp.

The announcement was cheered by activists who have long decried the treatment of tens of thousands of workers who live and work on sprawling sugarcane fields, many of them Haitian migrants or descendants of them.

The announcement comes after the Department of Labor in September placed sugarcane from the Dominican Republic on its list of goods produced by children or via forced labor. The State Department also has cited the Dominican Republic in its report on human trafficking.