For Some Italians, the Future of WorkLooks Like the Past
對於義大利人而言，未來的工作會回歸從前
As the coronavirus drastically reorders society and economies, more Italians are returning to the agricultural jobs of their grandparents.
隨著新冠狀病毒疫情對於社會和經濟的影響日益深遠，越來越多的義大利人開始回歸他們祖輩所從事的農業生產活動中。
Strawberry picking in Franco Baraldi’s fieldslast week in Ferrara. Mr. Baraldi said the Italians he hired didn’t know what they were doing in the beginning, but had caught on.
上周在費拉拉佛朗哥·巴拉爾迪(Franco Baraldi)的田裡摘草莓。巴拉爾迪說，他僱傭的義大利人一開始並不知道自己在做什麼，但很快就明白了。
CORCOLLE, Italy — On a small farm outside Rome, workers crouched in the corridors of a corn field and tended to stalks for the coming harvest. The ones from Morocco, Romania and Nigeria knew exactly what to do. It was the new Italian hires who needed help.
義大利，科爾科勒——在羅馬郊外的一個小農場裡，工人們正在玉米田間忙碌，準備收割。對於摩洛哥、羅馬尼亞和奈及利亞的移民，他們都知道該怎麼做。真正需要指導的，是那些剛剛聘請的義大利人。
「These you have to get rid of,」 the farm’s owner told Massimiliano Cassina, pointing at some cobs on the bottom of the plant.
「這些你必須處理掉，」農場的主人指著玉米底部的一部分對Massimiliano Cassina說。
Only weeks ago, Mr. Cassina, 52,was running a fabric company that had international clients and specialized insports T-shirts. But the coronavirus pandemic that has killed more than 30,000 Italians and wrecked the national economy also dealt a death blow to his business. Desperate for a paycheck, he became one of an increasing number ofItalians seeking a future in the country’s agrarian past.
就在幾周前，52歲的Cassina先生還在經營一家面料公司，該公司擁有國際客戶，專門生產運動t恤。但隨著疫情的大爆發，3萬多名義大利人相繼死亡、義大利的國民經濟被嚴重摧毀，他的生意也遭受了致命性打擊。越來越多的義大利人希望能夠在過去的農耕生活中尋找未來，渴望薪水的他也成了他們的一員。
「They gave me a chance,」 Mr. Cassina, wearing a blue mask, blue rubber gloves and sweat-stained shirt, said。
「他們給了我一個機會，」Cassina先生說，他戴著藍色口罩，戴著藍色橡膠手套，穿著一件汗漬斑斑的襯衫。
Massimiliano Cassina ran a fabric company which was forced to close during the pandemic. He now works as an agricultural laborer in Corcolle, near Rome.
馬西米利亞諾卡西納(Massimiliano Cassina)經營一家面料公司，該公司在流感大流行期間被迫關閉。他現在在羅馬附近的科勒做農業工人。
Italy industrialized after World War II, and never really looked back. But the virus has drastically reordered society and economies, locking seasonal workers in their home countries while marooning Italians who worked in retail, entertainment, fashion and other once-mighty industries.
義大利在二戰後實現了全面工業化，而且這一切從未有過變化。但是這場疫情極大地重塑了社會和經濟秩序，把那些季節性工人牢牢地困在他們的家鄉，讓那些從事零售、娛樂、時尚和其他曾經強大的產業工作的人們無路可走。
Where until recently a return to the land seemed reserved for natural wine hipsters orgentry sowing boutique gardens with ancient seeds, more Italians are now considering the work of their grandparents as laborers on the large farms that are increasingly essential to feed a paralyzed country and continent.
直到最近，回歸故土似乎還只是自然的葡萄酒潮人或是用古老種子在精品花園播種的紳士們的專屬需求。如今，越來越多的義大利人開始考慮回歸屬於他們祖輩的大農場，這些農場對於養活一個陷入癱瘓的國家和深陷泥潭的歐洲大陸顯得越來越重要。
Without them, hundreds of tons of broccoli, fava beans, fruit and vegetables are in danger of withering on the vine or rotting on the ground.
沒有他們，數百噸的西蘭花、蠶豆、水果和蔬菜就有枯萎或是腐爛的危險。
「The virus has forced us to rethink the models of development and the way the country works,」 Teresa Bellanova, Italy’s agricultural minister, who is herself a former farmhand, said in an interview.
「這場疫情迫使我們開始重新思考新的經濟發展模式和對於這個國家而言更好的運作方式。」義大利農業部長特蕾莎貝拉諾娃(Teresa Bellanova)在接受採訪時說。
She said that the virus required Italy, which has remained at the vanguard of the epidemic and its consequences in Europe, to confront 「a scarcity of food for many levels of the population,」including unemployed young professionals, and that agriculture needed to be「where the new generations can find a future.」
她表示，這場疫情的爆發使義大利在整個歐洲首當其衝，讓義大利不得不面對「不同層次的人都將共同面對的糧食短缺」局面，包括那些失業的年輕人們。農業需要成為「新一代能夠找到未來的地方」。
To do that, agriculture needed to shake off the backward stigma of Europe’s preindustrial and pre-technological past and emphasize its use of sophisticated technology, machinery and chemistry. She said she had discussed such a shift with her French counterpart and the same was true for Spain and Germany and beyond as the virus laid waste to other sectors. 「Agriculture doesn’t mean a return to the hoe,」 she said.
要做到這一點，農業需要擺脫歐洲前工業化和前技術時代的落後烙印，強調先進技術、機械和化學的使用。她表示，她已與法國外長討論過這種轉變，西班牙和德國以及其他國家也是如此，因為疫情摧毀了其它行業。「發展農業並不意味著要回歸鋤頭，」她說。
Strawberrypicking in Franco Baraldi’s fields.
工人們在在佛朗哥·巴拉爾迪的田裡採摘草莓。
If Italians now need the fields to survive, the farms also suddenly need Italians. Despite vigorous lobbying by agricultural groups to create so-called Green Corridors to ease their arrival, about 150,000 seasonal workers from Romania, Poland, India and elsewhere are locked out of Italy.
如果說義大利人現在需要靠種田來生存，那麼農場主們也突然需要僱傭很多人。儘管農業工會的人正在積極遊說，希望能夠建立綠色通道方便他們僱傭更多的工人，但是來自羅馬尼亞、博覽、印度和其他地方的約15萬的季節性工人仍然被擋在義大利之外。
At the same time, Italians, who previously constituted about 36 percent of Italy’s roughly 1 million agricultural workers, are finding their restaurants, tour companies and stores shuttered. The safer working conditions outdoors are proving attractive. So is a paycheck.
與此同時，義大利人發現，他們不得不關閉他們的餐館、旅遊公司和商店，在義大利約100萬農業工人中，義大利人以前佔了大約36%。
Italy’s leading agricultural associations have set up websites with names like Agrijob and Jobincountry and drawn more than 20,000 applications, most of them from Italians, to fill the shortfall.
義大利主要的農業協會已經建立了網站，像是Agrijob和Jobincountry，並吸引了超過2萬份申請，其中大部分來自義大利，以填補空缺。
「Manna from heaven,」 is how PaoloFigna, 26, who lost his job as a waiter, described work picking strawberries ona farm outside Verona.
26歲的保羅·費格納(Paolo Figna)失去了服務生的工作，他形容自己在維羅納郊外的農場裡摘草莓的工作是「來自天堂的嗎哪」。
But the transition for many has not been easy. Agricultural work has become as foreign to Italians as the seasonal workers from other countries who have filled the ranks of farm hands for decades.
但對於大部分人而言，轉型並不容易，農業生產對於義大利人而言已經成為外國人主導的行業，那些其他國家的季節性工人已經取代他們工作了好幾十年。
Massimiliano Giansanti, the president of Confagricoltura, one of Italy’s largest agricultural associations, said many of those who were interested in the work didn’t have the necessary training or experience.
義大利最大的農業協會之一Confagricoltura的主席Massimiliano Giansanti說，很多對這項工作感興趣的人沒有必要的培訓或經驗。
「Agriculture is not picking a red apple from a tree,」 he said, explaining that, far from the House and Garden idyll of the Italian imagination, farming was a modern industry that required know-how, commitment and flexibility.
「農業並不是從樹上摘紅蘋果，」他說，他解釋道，農業與義大利想像中的田園住宅和花園相去甚遠，它是一項現代產業，需要技術、承諾和靈活性。
For now, he said, 「the majority」 ofthe Italians inquiring about positions posted on the association’s Agrijob platform still considered it gardening. Bruno Francescon, 45, the owner of a melon farm in Mantova, hired Italians who had worked in hotels and drivenbuses. He said he missed his 「professionally very prepared」 workers from India and Morocco. An influx of Italians, he said, 「doesn’t compensate for the lack of skills.」 And some of the Italians he hired simply 「ran away.」
他說，就目前而言，「大多數」義大利在詢問農業工作平臺上發布的招聘信息時，仍然認為他們將面對的是園藝工作。45歲的布魯諾·弗朗西絲孔(Bruno Francescon)是曼託瓦一個甜瓜農場的老闆，他僱傭了曾在酒店和公交車上工作過的義大利人。他說，他想念來自印度和摩洛哥「非常專業、準備充分」的員工。他說，義大利人的湧入「並不能彌補技能的缺乏」。他僱傭的一些義大利人乾脆「逃跑」了。
Others who have found themselves inthe fields had envisioned a career connected to the land. Just not soconnected.
另一些人發現他們身處農場時才發現，這一切和他們曾經設想的，與土地相關的職業，有很大的差別。
Anna Flora, 23, grew up enchanted by stories of her grandfather’s horse farm, which he had to sell off because his children showed no interest in continuing. Her passion for the land remained, though, and in February she found a job selling hail insurance to farms around Italy.
23歲的安娜·弗洛拉(Anna Flora)從小就被祖父的馬場故事深深吸引，後來他不得不賣掉馬場，因為他的孩子們對繼續經營馬場沒有興趣。儘管如此，她對土地的熱情依然不減。今年2月，她找到了一份向義大利各地農場出售冰雹保險的工作。
But it was the virus that struck. The firm closed and she applied to sporting goods and pet food shops as a salesperson. They closed, too. Then hertown of Ferrara advertised a program to replace the missing seasonal laborers with local workers and Ms. Flora applied.
但壓倒駱駝的最後一根稻草是疫情的爆發，公司面臨倒閉，她申請在體育用品店和寵物食品店做銷售，然後他們也倒閉了。之後，她所在的費拉拉鎮宣傳了一個新的項目，用當地的工人替代了那些無法入境的季節性勞工，所以弗洛拉申請了這個項目。
After weeks of picking strawberries, she said she found the work fulfilling, but also gainful. Plus, she said, 「My grandfather is very, very happy.」
在採摘草莓數周后，她說她發現這份工作很充實，但也很有收穫。此外，她說，「我的祖父非常非常高興。」
Anna Flora leaving the strawberry field aftera day of work.
安娜·弗洛拉結束一天的工作，離開草莓田。
Ms. Flora was one of the more than 50 applicants for 12 positions posted on the Agrijob website to substitute formissing Polish workers at a farm owned by Franco Baraldi.
在Agrijob網站上發布的招聘信息中，有12個職位的申請人超過50人，弗洛拉是其中之一。這12個職位是為弗朗哥巴拉爾迪(Franco Baraldi)的一個農場主尋找能夠替代那些無法入境的波蘭工人而提供的工作。
Mr. Baraldi, 59, said the Italian she hired — people who had worked in bakeries and cafes and supermarkets —didn’t know what they were doing in the beginning, but that they caught on. He said many hadn’t earned anything since March or received the help promised to them by the government. Several have asked him to stay on after the strawberry harvest for the apricot and peach season.
現年59歲的巴拉爾迪說，他僱傭的義大利人都曾在麵包房、咖啡館和超市工作過，他們一開始並不知道自己在做什麼，但很快就適應了。他說，自3月份以來，許多人沒有掙到任何錢，也沒有得到政府承諾的幫助。有幾個人告訴他希望能在草莓收穫的季節過後留下來，為了之後的杏和桃子的收穫季節做準備。
He said he hoped that they could, but that the future of agriculture depended on government help. Since his grandfather’s days running the farm, he said, the state had abandoned the industry. If the young didn’t follow their parents into the fields, it was because 「no one helped them.」 Without the subsidies given to other industries, he said, farms couldn’t make a profit, creating the conditions for unscrupulous landowners to under pay foreign workers.
他說他希望他們可以，但是農業的未來取決於政府的幫助。他說，自從祖父經營農場以來，國家就拋棄了這個行業。如果年輕人不跟隨父母到地裡幹活，那是因為「沒有人幫助他們」。他說，如果沒有對其他行業的補貼，農場就無法盈利，從而那些農場主將更加肆無忌憚的向外國工人支付很低的工資。
This month, the Italian government set aside more than a billion euros (about $1.1 billion) of subsidies to farmers as part of a 55-billion-euro relief package. The measure became asource of acrimonious political debate, though, because it also included apathway to legalization for undocumented workers in the fields.
本月，義大利政府撥出超過10億歐元(約11億美元)的補貼給農民，作為550億歐元救助計劃的一部分。不過，由此也引發了一場激烈的政治辯論。因為這讓無證勞工在農場的工作更加合法化了。
Ms. Bellanova choked up in announcing the measure, which she said in an interview would help integrationin Italy but also fill the shortfall of laborers created by the virus.
貝拉諾瓦在宣布這項措施時哽咽了，她在一次採訪中說，這將有助於義大利的融合，但也會填補由疫情影響造成的勞動力短缺。
Critics said that legalizationwould do little to compensate for the labor shortfall, because those undocumented workers were already working the fields, just in exploitative conditions that grossly underpaid and overworked them. Populists both in andout of the Italian government argued that the minister was exploiting the epidemic to further a progressive agenda. Austin Okoro, 25, a Nigerian with awork permit who picked corn with Mr. Cassina outside Rome, said his friends without legal status would jump at a job like his. But he also said that he didn’t be grudge the Italians who had joined him in the cornfield.
批評人士則指出，這樣的合法化根本無法彌補勞動力的短缺現象，因為那些無證的工人已然開始在農場裡幹活了，他們工資很低，工作過度。義大利政府內外的民粹主義者都認為，這位部長是在利用疫情來推進進步議程。25歲的奈及利亞人奧斯汀·奧科洛(Austin Okoro)有工作許可，他和卡西納在羅馬郊外一起採摘玉米。奧科洛說，他那些沒有合法身份的朋友會欣然接受他這樣的工作。但他也說，他並不嫉妒那些和他一起在玉米地裡幹活的義大利人。
「They are doing fine,」 he said with a smile.
「他們做得很好，」他笑著說。
The main question, though, remained the absence of trained seasonal workers and getting enough workers in time for the coming harvests.
然而，主要的問題依然是缺少有經驗的季節工人，還有無法在即將到來的收穫季節之前找到足夠的工人來完成田裡的工作。
Confagricoltura has organized flights carrying hundreds of Moroccan workers, paid for privately by farms, toarrive in Italy this week. A wine grower in the northern region of Alto Adige, complained that the Italians he had hired bailed on him and so he chartered a flight to bring eight seasoned Romanian workers to his vineyard.
Confagricoltura 在摩洛哥招募了數百名工人，由僱傭他們的農場主支付航班費用，乘坐包機，本周抵達了義大利。在北部的上阿迪傑地區，一位葡萄酒莊園的莊園主抱怨說，他僱傭的那些義大利人讓他並不放心，所以他租了架飛機，把8名經驗豐富的羅馬尼亞工人請進了他的葡萄園工作。
But compared with Germany, which has allowed for the arrival of for tens of thousandsof seasonal laborers, this amounted to a drop in the bucket. Italy’s experience has been echoed in other parts of Europe. Prince Charles, Queen Elizabeth II’s eldest son andthe heir to the British throne, has urged furloughed workers across the nationto join a government campaign aimed at finding farm labor to 「pick for Britain」 and save the season’s crops asthe country faces a dearth of migrant workers.
但與德國相比，這不過是九牛一毛。德國允許成千上萬的季節性勞工到來。義大利的經驗在歐洲其他地區也得到了實踐。英國女王伊莉莎白二世的長子、王位繼承人查爾斯王子日前呼籲全國範圍內所有的下崗工人，希望他們都能來參加一項政府發起的旨在尋找農場勞動力的運動，以便在英國面臨勞工短缺的情況下「為英國採摘」並保存當季的莊稼。
In Italy, some officials and farmers have looked for a potential pool of laborers among the poorest Italians, many of whom live in the country’s economically depressed south and who in 2018 started receiving a monthly universal income check.
在義大利，一些官員和農民一直在最貧困的義大利人中尋找潛在的勞動力來源，其中許多人生活在該國經濟蕭條的南部地區，他們從2018年開始每月接受一次全面收入檢查。
Francesco D』Amore, who grows tomatoes near Caserta, in the southern region of Campania, burst out laughing when asked if he thought people would give up their guaranteed welfare checks to go back to the fields.
在南部坎帕尼亞地區卡瑟塔附近種植西紅柿的弗朗西斯科達莫在被問及人們是否會放棄有保障的救濟金回到田間時，他大笑起來。
But this month, the government created the possibility for recipients of the benefit to put it on hold for up to 60 days if they found a job in agriculture. Nazaro Lo Iacono, 56, who lives near Caserta and has received the basic income subsidy, said that with the new guarantee, he would happily let someone else temporarily take his welfare check and return to pick tomatoes, as he had done in his youth, as long as he received a proper contract.
但是在本月，政府似乎創造了這樣一種可能，如果人們在農場找到了工作，就可以在六十天內暫停領取救濟金。56歲的Nazaro Lo Iacono住在卡瑟塔附近，他已經拿到了基本收入補貼。他說，有了新的保障，他會很高興地讓別人來領救濟金，他自己回來採摘西紅柿，就像他年輕時做的那樣，只要他得到一份合適的合同。
The problem, he said, was that「dishonest」 farm owners chased Italians away by slashing wages and under paying exploited foreigners. 「We grew distant from the earth for this reason,」 hesaid.
他說，問題在於，「不誠實」的農場主通過削減工資和付給被剝削的外國人更低的工資把義大利人趕走了。「因為這個原因，我們能做的越來越少，」他說。
Back in the cornfield, Mr. Cassina said he missed his old life as he got on his hands and knees, dirtying his shorts. The farm’s owner, Vittorio Galasso, 62, observed his progress.
再度回到玉米地，Cassina先生說，他很懷念過去的日子，那時的他跪在玉米地裡勞動，弄髒了自己的短褲。農場的主人，62歲的Vittorio Galasso看到了這一切。
「He’s getting used to it,」 he said.
「他正在慢慢熟悉這一切，」他說。
本文英文原文及所有圖片均來自紐約時報，僅供交流學習，侵權可刪！