Experts from around the nation will gather at a Cornell University conference May 22 to explore how historical perspectives, current trends and public policies shape and affect United States farm labor and rural communities. The conference, "Our Roots Feed Our Future," will be held at the Clarion Hotel in Ithaca, beginning at noon.

The conference is sponsored by the Cornell Migrant Program, which is based in the Department of Human Development in Cornell's College of Human Ecology, and is part of the program's 30th anniversary celebration. The conference is open to the public, by prior registration, and will include the views of present and former farmworkers, research overviews and presentations from experts on promoting change for farmworkers and helping rural communities grow.

Participants also will have the opportunity to attend one of six workshops on topics ranging from challenges to organizing farm labor to illegal immigration and rural poverty. All participants will receive papers from each of the presenters.

Says Herb Engman, director of the migrant program: "The majority of migrant farmworkers today are not American citizens and are therefore highly vulnerable. Yet, they provide a backbone upon which much of agriculture depends by performing arduous physical labor and facing numerous obstacles such as institutional racism and prejudice. Migrants do not share many of the basic rights of other working citizens, such as overtime pay, day of rest, equal access to unemployment and disability insurance and coverage under collective bargaining laws. This celebration is not only to inform participants about the current status of farmworkers but to look ahead to the future."

Prior to the conference, there will be a free tour of a traveling exhibit, "Coming Up on the Season: Migrant Farmworkers in the Northeast," at the DeWitt Historical Society's Tompkins County Museum in Ithaca. Displays include tools and objects used by migrant workers, paintings by migrant workers and extensive photographic documentation of the lives of migrant workers. The exhibit also includes excerpts from both farmers' and workers' oral histories. Topping off the day will be an anniversary celebration dinner, with Mexican, Caribbean and African-American food on the menu, plus an historical event, music and dancing.

The migrant program is among the oldest of the migrant extension efforts among land-grant universities and the most comprehensive in approach. In the late 1960s, Cornell was directly involved in the hiring of migrant farm labor on its demonstration farm in Wayne County, N.Y. Considerable controversy surrounded the working and living conditions there, and the farm eventually closed. In 1971, Cornell's College of Agriculture and Life Sciences and Cornell Cooperative Extension initiated a new program, the Agricultural Manpower Project, which later became the Wayne County Special Migrant Project and now is the migrant program.

To register for the conference or dinner, which have registration fees, or for more information, contact Kay Embrey, Cornell Migrant Program, at ke20@cornell.edu or phone at (315) 483-4092.