It is one of the most celebrated symbols of French refinement — Champagne, the golden effervescence of celebration, poured from polished flutes at weddings, presidential receptions, and the New Year’s toast.
But behind the glittering façade of France’s €6 billion sparkling wine industry, a darker story has emerged in a courtroom in Reims, where three individuals are on trial for human trafficking and the exploitation of dozens of migrant workers.
The case, which opened this week in the eastern city known as the capital of Champagne, centres on the grim fate of 57 undocumented migrants, mainly from West Africa, who were promised “well-paid work” picking grapes during the 2023 harvest. Instead, they found themselves crammed into squalid housing and forced into gruelling conditions that prosecutors describe as a “serious breach of dignity.”
The accused — a Frenchman, a Georgian man, and a Kyrgyz woman identified as Svetlana G., who ran a recruitment agency called Anavim — are facing a litany of charges, including human trafficking, employing foreigners without permits, failure to declare workers, and housing vulnerable individuals in degrading conditions. If convicted, they face up to seven years in prison and substantial fines.
According to the prosecution, the victims, ranging in age from 16 to 65, had been lured through a WhatsApp message circulated within the Soninke community in Paris — a network comprising migrants from Mali, Mauritania, Senegal, and Ivory Coast. Many of them arrived at Nesle-le-Repons, a village nestled amid the rolling hills of Champagne country, expecting legal seasonal work. What they found instead, says the state, was near-medieval exploitation.
“They shouted at us in Russian and crammed us into this broken-down house, with mattresses on the floor,” said Kanouitié Djakariayou, 44, a Malian national who is one of the plaintiffs in the case. “There was no clean water, and the only food was a bowl of rice and rotten sandwiches. I never thought the people who made champagne would put us up in a place which even animals would not accept.”
Another worker, Doumbia Mamadou, 45, said he still suffers the psychological effects of the ordeal. “We were traumatised by the experience,” he told L’Union, a local newspaper. “And we have had no psychological support, because when you have no papers, you have no rights either.”
Authorities were alerted only after a local resident contacted labour inspectors, who arrived on site to find the group living in hazardous conditions. The inspection revealed outdoor cooking and dining areas exposed to the elements, filthy toilets, broken showers with sporadic hot water, and faulty electrics.
The migrants worked 10-hour days in the vineyards with only a 30-minute lunch break, transported there squatting in the back of trucks. There were no contracts, and wages bore “no relation to the work performed,” the court heard. Prosecutor Annick Browne described the conditions as “a flagrant violation of the workers’ health, safety, and human dignity.”
“The accused had a total disregard for human dignity,” said Maxime Cessieux, a lawyer for several of the workers. “This wasn’t just negligence. It was deliberate, systematic abuse.”
The case has sent ripples through France’s prized champagne industry, which depends on more than 120,000 seasonal workers every year. Every grape must be picked by hand — a tradition that endows the product with its celebrated finesse but also opens the door to exploitation, especially when labour is subcontracted through informal channels.
In 2023 alone, six grape-pickers reportedly died from heatstroke during harvest season in the Champagne and Beaujolais regions. Two other criminal cases have also emerged in recent years involving similar abuses.
Trade unions have called for sweeping reforms. José Blanco of the CGT union says the current system allows major producers to hide behind layers of subcontractors. “It should not be possible to harvest the grapes of champagne using human misery,” he said, calling for legislation that would strip the “champagne” designation from producers found complicit in labour abuses — even indirectly.
So far, the Comité Champagne, the industry’s powerful governing body, has attempted to distance itself from the scandal. It is attending the trial as a civil plaintiff, citing the damage done to the brand’s global reputation. “These practices are unacceptable and extremely rare,” the Comité said in a statement. “When identified, they are stopped immediately.”
But for the men and women who picked the grapes in silence — in conditions unfit for farm animals, let alone humans — the scars are still raw. For them, the promise of seasonal work in the idyllic vineyards of Champagne turned out to be a nightmare. And as the courtroom proceedings unfold in Reims, the world is being reminded that the glamour of France’s most iconic export may well be propped up by some of its darkest labour practices.
Main Image: — Travail personnel via Wikipedia.
