Agricultural workers — including Women, youth, landless peasants, tenant farmers, sharecroppers, and wage laborers — face some of the harshest working and living conditions in Pakistan. With agriculture employing nearly 37% of the labor force, most of them informal and unregistered, these workers are excluded from labour protections, deprived of minimum wages, and vulnerable to exploitation, debt bondage, and harassment and left to shoulder the burdens of economic crisis, climate disasters, and state neglect.

May Day is a reminder that the struggles of industrial and urban workers are deeply connected to those of rural and agricultural laborers. Yet agricultural workers in Pakistan are still excluded from labor laws, denied the right to unionize, and invisible in national policy-making.

Structural Exploitation of Agricultural Workers in Pakistan

Although agriculture employs over one-third of the national workforce, most agricultural labor is informal, with no written contracts, legal protections, or access to social security.

Women agricultural workers, who make up 70% of the active labor force in rural agriculture, are not even recognized as formal workers. They earn significantly less than men, often paid in kind, and face systemic discrimination, gender-based violence, and exclusion from decision-making. Most women work without contracts, without access to social security, maternity leave, or medical care, and face widespread gender-based violence, both in the fields and in their communities.

Young workers in agriculture, especially those from landless or tenant families, are trapped in intergenerational poverty. With little access to education, training, or credit, they are forced into exploitative wage labor or seasonal migration.

The Sindh Tenancy Act and other protective laws remain largely unenforced, with powerful landlords exploiting tenants and sharecroppers through informal agreements that leave workers trapped in cycles of poverty and indebtedness. In provinces like Punjab and Balochistan, government negligence, corporate land grabs, and climate-induced disasters such as floods and droughts have further deepened rural inequality and undermined food sovereignty.

The 2022 floods and ongoing climate change impacts have devastated rural livelihoods — with over $30 billion in agricultural losses, rising temperatures, and disappearing water sources making rural work even more precarious. Despite a declared minimum wage of Rs. 37,000/month, most agricultural workers earn far less, with no enforcement mechanisms or state oversight. Meanwhile, inflation and poverty levels continue to rise, with nearly 40% of Pakistan’s population living below the poverty line, including millions of rural workers.

Legal and Political Disempowerment

Agricultural workers are not protected by labor laws, and cannot unionize or collectively bargain under current legal frameworks. Recent legislative developments like the Punjab Labour Code 2024have further restricted workers’ rights, while Sindh’s Home-Based Workers Act and Tenancy Acts remain mostly unimplemented. Freedom of association is routinely suppressed, and trade unionists — including those in agriculture and related sectors — face harassment, dismissal, and violence.

The Cost of State Neglect and Elitism

The 2024-25 federal budget allocated shockingly little to healthcare, education, or rural development. Defense and debt servicing dominate national spending, while landlords, agro-corporations, and real estate elites enrich themselves at the expense of peasants and rural workers. Despite record profits in export-oriented agriculture and agribusiness, there is no redistribution of wealth, no land reforms, and no mechanisms to protect the workers who generate this wealth.

PKRC’s May Day Demands: Justice for Agricultural Workers Now!

1.⁠ ⁠Legal recognition of agricultural workers as formal labor, with full access to unionization and collective bargaining rights.

2.⁠ ⁠Enforcement of minimum wage laws in agriculture, with accountability for wage theft and informal exploitation.

3.⁠ ⁠Special protections and programs for women and youth in agriculture, including access to credit, land, education, healthcare, and legal support.

4.⁠ ⁠Land reforms to ensure secure tenure for tenant farmers and landless peasants, and to curb corporate land grabbing.

5.⁠ ⁠Universal social protection — pensions, maternity benefits, accident insurance, and climate-resilient safety nets for rural workers.

6.⁠ ⁠Incorporation of the UN Declaration on the Rights of Peasants (UNDROP) into Pakistan’s legal and policy frameworks.

This May Day, PKRC echoes the call for worker solidarity and rural justice:

“No food without agricultural workers – No justice without their rights!”

“Women feed the nation – recognize their labor, protect their rights!”

“Youth deserve land, learning, and a future — not poverty and migration!”

May 1, 2025

Pakistan Kissan Rabita Committee (PKRC)

Qammar Abbas