Labor & Employment Law

Immokalee Freedom March Challenges Publix to Do the Right Thing

By James Parks

More than 1,000 farm workers and religious, student and fair food activists braved the rain for a massive picket, march and rally in Lakeland, Fla., Sunday to demand that Publix Super Markets respect the human rights of the workers who provide the food on the store shelves.

Here’s how Eric Holt Gimenez described the scene on Huffington Post:

Despite a steady drizzle, marchers laid a double picket line down the entire long block of the Publix shopping center, marching, singing and dancing. Bilingual chants of “Hey hey, ho ho Publix poverty has got to go!” and Publix, escucha, el pueblo esta en la lucha!

 A stream of vehicles drove past the protesters, many honking their horns in support.

Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) spokesman Gerardo Reyes-Chavez told the crowd:

Publix is at a crossroads…they can take the road of justice…or continue on the road of exploitation!

The rally was the culmination of a three-day, 22-mile Freedom March from Tampa to Publix headquarters in Lakeland. The march was sponsored by the CIW, Interfaith Action and the Student/Farmworker Alliance. Marching behind the mobile Florida Modern-Day Slavery Museum, workers delivered a simple, but urgent, message?they want to be free from poverty and abuse.

The workers are demanding safer, more humane working conditions and a penny more per pound of tomatoes picked. Florida tomato pickers earn 45 cents for a 32-pound bucket of tomatoes, a rate that has not changed for three decades.

Publix can easily afford the extra penny, since it is the richest privately held company in Florida, the workers say. While Publix does not employ the workers directly, it has a responsibility to make sure its suppliers treat workers fairly, CIW says.

The workers are asking Publix to sign an agreement similar to ones that have been signed  by other food companies. The latest is the mega food service company Aramark, which signed a pact April 1. The agreement establishes a supplier code of conduct developed and implemented with input from farm workers. Aramark also will pay a 1.5-cent premium for every pound of tomatoes picked, with the premium distributed directly to the workers.

Aramark joins a growing list of companies that have signed agreements with CIW, including Compass Group North America, Bon Appetit Management Co., Subway, Taco Bell and its corporate parent, Yum! Brands, McDonald’s, Burger King Whole Foods Market and the Chipotle Mexican Grill restaurant chain.

Full post as published by AFL-CIO NOW BLOG on April 23, 2010 (boomark / email).