Study: Guatemala’s tortilla industry depends on girls’ labor

By SONIA PÉREZ D.
Associated Press

GUATEMALA CITY (AP) — For millions of Guatemalan families hand-made corn tortillas are indispensable with every meal, but many of those tortillas pass through the hands of girls and young women trapped in poverty. They often work 12 to 15 hours a day, seven days a week and are paid little if at all. Without time to study and already facing discrimination as Indigenous women from rural villages, tortilla shops become dead end jobs for the girls. A report financed by the U.S. Agency for International Development and Pan American Development Foundation this year reviewed 292 tortilla shops in Guatemala and found girls working in 160 of them.