Editor’s Note: In this week’s Thursday Feature, we travel to South America to visit a busy Argentinean port where the workers are the bosses.
At the San Lorenzo port near the city of Rosaria — Argentina’s second largest city — ships pull up to the dock 24 hours per day where they are loaded with enormous mountains of wheat flour, soybeans, corn and other food products.
While many people in the northern hemisphere may have never heard of the port — or the Paraná River on which it stands — it’s Argentina’s busiest export facilities, handling an astonishing 85% of the nation’s raw food products, as well as edible oil, petrochemicals and ceramics.
With a series of port terminals stretching 31 miles along the river’s coastline, the port is home to nearly 1,000 workers who keep it running 24 hours per day. Last year, more than 6.2 million tons of products passed through the port. No wonder it is sometimes referred to as “the breadbasket of the world.”
‘Workers Over Profits’
Argentina is no longer a leftist country. And the military junta that ruled the South American nation with an iron fist is long gone. Today, the nation of more than 42 million people is presided over by the democratically elected president Christina Fernandez de Kirchner.
Still, the reverbations of socialism can still be felt, even in the port of San Lorenzo.
The port is owned by the General San Martin Port Workers’ Cooperative, which was founded by Herme Juárez in 1969.
Juarez, who still runs the workers’ cooperative, said operations at the facility put the safety and benefit of the workers before business concerns.
“There are many occupational hazards in dock work, but ‘people over profit’ is a rule by which any decisions are made, particularly with regard to safety,” Juarez told the website Hub4.
Up until 1996, ships at the port were loaded by hand. Workers using shovels fed grain, flour and other food products into vast conveyors. But this was dangerous work, according to Pedro Fydrizswski, a worker at the dock. Since then, wheel loaders and other heavy equipment has been used to move the food products more safely.
“We use the machines to push the flour through a grille in the floor on to a conveyor belt which takes it to the boat,” he said. “The job used to be dangerous because the towering mountains of tightly packed flour could have been sitting there for as long as a month and is prone to loosen unexpectedly, causing an avalanche of flour on to the machines and workers. Incorporation of the wheel loaders has reduced accidents by 95%.”
A single warehouse at the port can contain up to 180,000 tons of food products that are piled into massive mounds more than 100 feet high.
Operators increase safety even further by attaching crane extensions on to the wheel loaders. These are then used to push the products from a distance into the grilles that feed the massive conveyors, so operators don’t have to get as close to the towering mountains of grain, wheat and corn.
Profits Go Back to the People
Increasing safety through the use of more than 79 Volvo wheel loaders and other trucks used at the port has increased both the speed at which materials can be loaded onto barges and the profits that the workers’ cooperative earns.
“Due to the speed at which we can now load the boats, we are saving our clients hours of time,” Juárez said. “We have achieved everything we have with Volvo. But obviously the Volvos don’t drive themselves. They are operated by people.”
The workers’ group uses some of the money to fund social programs and community outreach projects.
It also recently paid for a new emergency rescue center at the port, which has been equipped with brand new helicopters, ambulance boats and land ambulances. The center, which is specifically designed to respond to industrial accidents within the massive port facility, is the first of its kind in Latin America.
The Town that Works
The port at San Lorenzo is the lifeblood of this part of Argentina. It lies near the country’s northeast border with Uruguay, nearly 200 miles upriver from Buenos Aires.
“The town moves at the rhythm that the port dictates,” said Juárez. “The port plays such an important role in the local community.”
But it’s not all work and no play at the facility. During last year’s end of the year celebrations, to mark the port’s loading a record 6.3 million tons of goods, the workers’ cooperative loaded the buckets of its biggest wheel loaders with ice and bottles of champagne and allowed workers to help themselves.
“It’s a privilege to work with General San Martin Port Workers’ Cooperative,” said Gustavo Casas, Volvo’s key accounts manager for Argentina. “With its vision and prioritization of its workers, the cooperative is an ideal partner for Volvo CE.”