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Founded in 2005, the Northwest Social & Environmental Justice Institute (NSEJI), Granger, WA, is the first farm worker environmental justice organization in the State of Washington. Its mission is to direct its efforts as a minority based organization in response to the cultural, educational, and informational isolation of the Hispanic/ Latino farm workers and other disadvantaged communities in Washington State. NSEJI strives to empower these communities to be informed of the environmental injustices and assist them in finding resolutions of these issues for the benefit of their health and communities. In carrying out its activities, NSEJI must overcome barriers of illiteracy, language, discrimination, poverty and illness.
Recently, NSEJI has been involved in educating the local communities through organizing and holding meetings regarding environmental risks such as water contamination, pesticide dangers, Hanford Nuclear Site clean-up (and the lack of clean-up), fish contaminated with DDT in the Yakima River and basically informing the communities to be aware of the man-made environmental dangers and what farm workers can do to prevent exposure.
NSEJI is recognized as representatives of the local farm workers at Federal and State hearings and are very visible in Spanish language newspapers and Radio KDNA (www.kdna.org).
In addition to the work that NSEJI does in Washington, they are also part of PDF's BASE Initiative. To read more about BASE click here.
By working to confront and find solutions to environmental threats to farm workers and the food we eat, the Northwest Social and Environmental Justice is moving forward a movement for peace and social justice. The Peace Development Fund is proud to be able to support the work of NSEJI through our Fiscal Sponsorship Program.
To learn more about the NSEJI, e-mail Martin Yanez (martinyanez533 [at] juno [dot] com).
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