The Dilution of Sustainability in Territories

Labour Precarity, Exploitation, and Extractivism Associated with Agribusiness in Mexico

Abstract

This paper presents a documentary case study that incorporates the role of the migrant agricultural labourer, who works under precarious conditions within the sphere of agro-industrial production, particularly in the production of strategic foodstuffs that, owing to their nutritional and commercial value in Mexico and other countries, are in high market demand. The corporate agribusiness regime dilutes and appropriates the discourse of sustainability as a device for commercial legitimisation, without altering the material conditions of production, thereby generating exploitation and extractivism—both of natural resources and of human labour—which it utilises for its economic growth. Through a qualitative-interpretive methodological design based on case analysis, three strategic export crops are examined: avocado, berries and lemon, drawing upon a review of academic literature, statistical information from official sources, research reports and government communications while adopting a historical perspective with a specific focus on the period 2010–2025. The findings demonstrate the operational logic of the agro-industrial model under a twofold extractivism: the expansion of the agricultural frontier, appropriating territories and natural resources; and the exploitation of precarious labour power of migrant agricultural labourers, further exacerbating their indigenous condition and increasing extreme poverty while maintaining export competitiveness. Thus, it is concluded that sustainability functions as a mechanism intrinsic to the same accumulation model, which incorporates environmental and labour critiques to its own advantage without modifying the conditions of dispossession that it engenders.