• HOME
• NEWS ARCHIVE
• ABOUT CIW
• TAKE ACTION
• ANTI-SLAVERY
• MEDIA
• CONTACT
• DONATE
• SEARCH SITE

 

October 4, 2012

BREAKING NEWS:

Chipotle signs agreement with CIW to join Fair Food Program!

From left to right, the CIW's Oscar Otzoy, Chipotle's Chris Arnold, and the CIW's Gerardo Reyes, joined in the background by student and faith allies, at today's signing ceremony at Chipotle's Denver headquarters.

From the joint press release:

(Note: With the signing of today's agreement, all plans for this weekend's
action in Denver are CANCELLED)

October 2, 2012

"Publix doesn't want us at the table... They want us under the table."

200 join Florida clergy for march on Publix in Sarasota to protest banning of minister from store for support of CIW!

With only a few days notice, religious leaders, farmworkers, and Fair Food activists from the Sarasota area organized an impressive, and inspiring, assembly and march on the Sarasota Publix store where just weeks before the Rev. Clay Thomas had been removed, and banned for a year, for his support of the Campaign for Fair Food.

Rev. Thomas' removal from the store had caused quite a stir in Sarasota, and the outpouring of support for him and for the cause of farmworker justice that he supports was a truly remarkable sight to see marching down city streets on a 95 degree Sunday afternoon. Signs reading, "My faith calls me to seek justice", "Our faith in justice will not waiver" and "Living out my faith is not a crime" were a powerful manifestation of the growing grassroots frustration with Publix's arrogant response to the CIW and to the prospect of participating in the award-winning Fair Food Program.

Media coverage of the event was strong, including these three stories and videos:

• Herald-Tribune:"Protesters ask Publix to support tomato harvesters"
  
  
• ABC 7: "Protest for the Fair Food Program in Sarasota"
  
  
• SNN 6: "Publix protest"

Here's an excerpt from the Herald-Tribune report:

Marchers carried with them a letter, signed by more than 40 religious leaders in the Sarasota area, strongly condemning Publix's action and its refusal to even meet with the CIW to discuss the Fair Food Program. The letter read, in part:

The march culminated in a delegation of clergy entering the store to deliver the letter and to purchase a bag of Publix's fair trade coffee -- just as Rev. Thomas had entered the same store weeks ago to purchase a sandwich, only to be so rudely removed from the store by Publix representatives aided by local police officers. Though the police were present again this past Sunday, this time Publix seemed to have backed down from its untenable banning of all who would support the CIW, allowing the delegation to purchase the coffee and to talk to the store manager (second from left, with white shirt and sunglasses in the photo below). The religious leaders called for Publix to extend its "proud" support for "livable wages and work conditions" -- as it says on every bag of Publix Fair Trade coffee -- for coffee harvesters abroad to tomato harvesters in their own home state:

The assembly, march, and delegation were a resounding success, and the message -- that farmworkers and their allies, Publix customers all -- will not be treated with disrespect was heard loud and clear.

One interesting note from the day: Mark Codd, the Publix representative who made the decision to remove Rev. Thomas and who had repeatedly antagonized participants in several past Campaign for Fair Food actions, was nowhere to be seen on this day. Perhaps Publix is learning that gratuitous insults, misinformation, and surveillance aren't the wisest strategy for interacting with customers who express legitimate concerns with the company's business practices.

If that is in fact the case, it is a welcome change after four years of almost unbroken antagonism. Time, of course, will tell.

September 30, 2012

Food movement leaders speak:
Stop the Chipocrisy!

Open letter to Chipotle CEO: CIW's Fair Food Program "a golden opportunity to... address historic inconsistency in your approach to social accountability."

In the lead up to Chipotle's "Cultivate" festival in Denver -- and to the Campaign for Fair Food's counter festival to protest Chipotle's exclusion of farmworkers from its vision of a sustainable food system -- an open letter is circulating among leaders of the country's food justice movement that levels a devastating critique at the self-styled "Food with Integrity" leader for its indefensible blind spot when it comes to human rights.

Already, several key figures in the growing movement for food justice have signed on to the letter -- including authors Eric Schlosser, Frances Moore Lappe, Raj Patel, and Barry Estabrook, and grassroots leaders Ben Burkett, Anim Steel, and Tom Philpott -- and the letter is expected to continue gathering support in the week ahead.

You can find the letter in its entirety here. It is well worth taking a few minutes to see what Chipotle's decision-makers will be reading this week as their company continues to pursue its charm offensive to win the favor of the food movement. That offensive, in which the Cultivate festivals figure importantly, will inevitably continue to be haunted by the contradiction at the heart of Chipotle's definition of sustainability until the company owns up to that contradiction and joins with farmworkers in a genuine partnership for farm labor rights.

To get you started on the letter, here is an extended excerpt:

You can read the letter in full here. And if you are interested in adding your name to the letter, you can contact us at workers@ciw-online.org.

There is much more to come in the build up to Saturday's big Cultivate festival in Denver, so check back soon for all the news!

September 28, 2012

A Call to Action: Two dozen Sarasota area religious leaders, two former Sarasota mayors call for urgent community-wide assembly this Sunday at 3:30, march and delegation to Publix store where pastor banned for supporting CIW!

"May Publix quickly turn from its current path and become a partner with us in ensuring human rights and a sustainable Florida tomato industry."

Ever since reporting two weeks ago on the removal (with police back-up, no less) and banning of the Rev. Clay Thomas from a Sarasota area Publix store -- for the crime of ordering a sandwich while wearing a CIW t-shirt ("Minister kicked out of Publix in wake of labor protest," 9/11/12) -- the Sarasota Herald Tribune editorial page has been buzzing with condemnation of the grocery giant's heavy-handed response to its customers' support for Fair Food.

One letter to the editor, by a 90-year-old member of the pastor's church, read:

While another suggested an interesting consumer response to Publix's "bumptiousness":

But it was a guest opinion piece that truly set the town buzzing, when twenty-two area religious leaders and two former mayors of Sarasota announced a call to action to demonstrate their solidarity with Rev. Thomas and the farmworkers whose mistreatment led, in a somewhat circuitous route, to his own ("Clergy protest Publix action," Sarasota Herald Tribune, 9/27/12). Their op/ed begins:

After discussing the Fair Food Program and its merits, the piece concludes:

What are you doing this Sunday at 3:30? Will you join them, and workers from Immokalee, in "praying with your feet" to let Publix know that Rev. Thomas is not alone, that our faith in justice will not waiver?

September 27, 2012

CIW chosen as honoree of the 2012
Food Sovereignty Prize!

"... for creating one of the most powerful and inspiring worker-led movements that is transforming not only an industry but the consciousness of a nation..."

In a truly wonderful bit of news that we are proud to be able to share today, the CIW has been recognized, along with three exceptional international agricultural worker organizations, as an honoree of the 2012 Food Sovereignty Award! Hosted by WhyHunger this year, the Food Sovereignty Award is the project of a wide collaboration of food movement leaders, including the National Family Farm Coalition, Grassroots International, Family Farm Defenders, and the Community Food Security Coalition, among others.

From the website announcing this year's honorees:

And because they are so encouraging, we would also like to share the words that accompanied the news of the CIW's recognition, the reasons given by the award sponsors for including the CIW in such an inspiring group of international organizations:

To be recognized by such an meaningful award -- with former honorees including the Landless Peasant Movement of Brazil and the Via Campesina -- is truly humbling. We would invite all Fair Food allies in the New York City area to make an effort to attend the October 10th award ceremony. Not only will the CIW's Lucas Benitez be there on behalf of the CIW, but it will be a great opportunity to learn more about the work of the other three honorees, Tom Morello will be there to speak and perform, and it's free!

Our deepest gratitude goes out to all the food movement leaders who have recognized our work with this award.

September 26, 2012

“There can be no legitimate definition of ‘integrity,’ sustainability or social responsibility when it comes to food without the participation of farmworkers and respect for our fundamental human rights." Oscar Otzoy, CIW

CIW, allies on the ground in Denver issue press release ahead of next week's "Cultivate" festival in Chipotle's hometown!

Two weeks ago, Chipotle held its first "Cultivate" festival of the year in Chicago. Though the company did its best to construct what one reporter called "a utopian smorgasbord of gourmet food, local farmers, celebrity chefs and free music," the Campaign for Fair Food was there like the proverbial fly in the punchbowl, reminding festival goers of the one -- and essential -- missing ingredient in its recipe for "Food with Integrity": respect for farmworkers.

From "In These Times" ("At Utopian Chipotle Festival, Immokalee Workers Protest ‘Food With Integrity’," 9/25/12):

This October 6th, the moveable feast that is the Cultivate festival will make its way to Chipotle's hometown of Denver, and the Campaign for Fair Food will be there, too. The organizing team arrived in Denver over a week ago, and has been reaching out to local student, faith, and community groups -- a coalition spearheaded by the remarkable Denver Fair Food -- ever since to build momentum for a full day of protests on the 6th.

Yesterday, the team issued a press release to announce its plans for the day of actions, and will be holding a press conference with Denver area allies this coming Monday morning outside Chipotle's corporate headquarters (where the bucket pyramid will be making another appearance!). Here below is an excerpt from the release:

There is much more to come in the days ahead as we ramp up to the big day, so check back soon for all the latest from Denver!

September 24, 2012

Brian McLaren: "The Scandal Of Publix and The Coalition of Immokalee Workers: A Christian Critique"

Pastors prepare to break the bread with which fasters ended the Fast for Fair Food outside Publix
headquarters in Lakeland, Florida, this past March

"We're people and we deserve more respect than what Publix has shown us thus far."

Earlier this month, the Rev. Clay Thomas, a Presbyterian minister and longtime ally of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, was removed from a Sarasota Publix store, threatened with arrest, and banned from returning to the store for one year -- for the crime of ordering a sandwich while wearing a CIW t-shirt.

The absurdity of Publix's latest reaction to the Campaign for Fair Food moved Brian McLaren -- the nationally known author, activist for social justice, and public theologian whom Time magazine called one of "the 25 most influential Evangelicals in America"-- to sit down and pour his thoughts into an article published today in the Huffington Post.

His article, entitled "The Scandal of Publix and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers: A Christian Critique," is a thorough take down of Publix's unconscionable decision to reject farmworkers', and its customers', calls to join the growing Fair Food Program. He measures Publix's actions against the company's own standards, citing the philosophy of business and service that Florida's largest grocer teaches all of its managers, a philosophy based on seven fundamental principles of good business defined years ago by company founder George Jenkins. Not surprisingly, he finds that the company's response to the CIW's campaign falls well short of its founder's ideals.

We will bring you excerpts of the Huffington Post article below, bur first, a little background on the event that inspired it. An article in the Sarasota Herald Tribune, "Minister kicked out of Publix in wake of labor protest" (9/11/12), described the events around Rev. Thomas' eviction from the Publix store:

Rev. Thomas told the paper that, ultimately, his religious beliefs were at the root of his removal from the store:

The Rev. Don Thompson, a retired United Methodist minister, agreed, telling the Herald Tribune:

The Herald Tribune article prompted Brian McLaren to imagine himself in Rev. Thomas' shoes. He begins his Huffington Post piece with the realization that he could easily find himself in the same situation, as he shares the same moral commitment, rooted in his faith, that compelled Rev. Thomas to support the CIW:

He then goes on to lament Publix's intransigence in response to the Campaign for Fair Food, writing, "Their persistence in avoiding honest, civil, and transparent conversation has been quite surprising."

From there, the article pivots into a point by point reflection on Publix's behavior in light of the seven principles established by founder George Jenkins decades ago. Here's an example, from the sixth principle, "Prepare for Opportunity":

And it concludes with a simple challenge to Publix's leaders:

It truly is a great read, one that shouldn't be missed. And once you've read it, stay tuned this week for more on this developing story, as an action is brewing for this weekend in Sarasota to protest the Rev. Thomas' mistreatment, and to remind Publix that faith can be a powerful force in the struggle for liberation of the poor and dispossessed -- far, far more powerful, ultimately, than pride, animosity, and avarice.

September 24, 2012

150th Anniversary of Emancipation Proclamation spurs reflections on Campaign for Fair Food...

"The CIW is making a difference, and can serve as a model for bringing together workers, corporations, and consumers to act for justice."

This past Saturday marked the 150th anniversary of President Abraham Lincoln's preliminary proclamation putting the Confederate states on notice that he would order the emancipation of the slaves in any state that did not return to the Union by January 1, 1863.

Also this past Saturday, two opinion writers reflected on that momentous anniversary to draw attention to "those who still live in bondage" today and to "one successful campaign to end forced labor (that) is right in our own backyards in Florida," the Campaign for Fair Food.

The first piece, "Ending modern slavery conditions in Florida," was written by the Rev. Parrish Jones, a Presbyterian minister from St. Augustine, Florida, and published in the Jacksonville Times Union. Here's an excerpt:

Rev. Jones goes on to suggest that readers who would like to support efforts to eradicate modern-day slavery should support the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food -- mentioning in particular the campaign to bring Publix into the Fair Food Program -- and the reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act.

The second piece, written by Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster and entitled "An Act of Justice: Reauthorize the Trafficking Victims Protection Act," was published in the blog Race Talk .Rabbi Kahn-Troster also singled out the Campaign for Fair Food for particular:

Both articles are well-written and thought provoking, Check them out today!

September 20, 2012

Pigs and workers unite at Chipotle "Cultivate" Festival in Chicago...

... call for "Food with Integrity" that includes respect for farmworkers, too!

A funny thing happened at Chipotle's "Cultivate" Festival in Chicago last weekend.

Chipotle organized the event -- "bringing together food, farmers, chefs, artisans, thought leaders, and musicians," in the words of the Cultivate website -- to celebrate the company's vision of "Food with Integrity". But that vision has always lacked one element essential to the food industry, one link in the supply chain without which there actually is no food, and that element is the farmworkers, the people whose undervalued labor gets the food from the fields and onto the trucks that carry it to Chipotle restaurants across the country every day.

Well, despite the fact that there was no booth highlighting the grueling, dangerous work farmworkers do, no "celebrity farmworkers" addressing the crowd, no songs celebrating their labor inside the Chipotle festival, farmworkers and their Fair Food allies still managed to make their presence known. A lively, creative and colorful event celebrating the CIW's Fair Food Program set up shop just outside the Cultivate Festival gates, and CIW allies Just Harvest USA were there to chronicle the day-long alternative to Chipotle's worker-less vision of integrity.

Go to the Just Harvest USA website today to see a complete photo report, with pics and a first-hand narrative from the event. And get ready for Round Two as the Just Harvest crew heads over to Denver to join with allies at the Denver Fair Food Committee with plans to set up shop again at the next Cultivate Festival, which will be held in Denver on October 6th!

September 16, 2012

"Publix maintains a hardness of heart that would do Pharaoh proud"...

Over 100 protesters marched from Publix to Chipotle in Naples, Florida, yesterday in a loud and colorful action that captured consumers' growing frustration with those companies' stubborn refusal to support the historic labor reforms taking shape today in Florida's tomato fields through the CIW's Fair Food Program.

Campaign for Fair Food ramping up for new season with protests at Publix stores in Tennessee, Tallahassee, Gainesville, and Naples!

As farmworkers filter back to Immokalee from the summer season up north, and students return to schools across the country with plans to accelerate their activism in support of the CIW's Fair Food Program, the pressure is building on Publix to stop hiding behind empty excuses and start doing its part to help improve the lives of the workers who pick its tomatoes.

The latest protest took place yesterday in Naples, Florida, where over 100 workers and Fair Food activists joined in a joyous protest. From the Naples Daily News:

Similar protests took place over the course of the past week in Nashville, TN (read the Leaf Chronicle story), and Gainesville (read the Gainesville Sun and Independent Alligator stories) and Tallahassee (see the WCTV story and read the FAMU student newspaper report), Florida.

Frustration with Publix's intransigence is reaching new heights, as reflected in letters and online posts by consumers who are growing weary of the company's hollow justifications for inaction. Father Frank Corbishley (Chaplain with the Episcopal Church Center at the University of Miami) shared a letter he is sending to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw with the CIW:

Meanwhile, Kate Savage from Nashville Fair Food penned a stellar reflection over Labor Day Weekend in which she makes a quick, back-of-the-envelope calculation of the cost of travel for Publix's representatives to Nashville from Lakeland to watch over their peaceful protests. She then compares that cost to the penny-per-pound that could be going to improve farmworkers' lives, concluding that, in the final analysis, Publix's refusal to join the Fair Food Program couldn't be about the economics of the situation, but rather about pride:

With students back in school across the country, and Student/Farmworker Alliance chapters from Florida to California making plans to ramp up the Campaign for Fair Food this coming season, Publix -- and the supermarket industry as a whole -- would do well to reconsider its strategy and get ahead of the growing consumer demand for Fair Food. In the 21st century, supermarkets can run, but they can't hide from a shopping public that is every day more informed about the labor conditions behind the food they eat, and every day more vocal about their desire for a food industry that respects human rights, not exploits human beings.

September 12, 2012

Letters from the Front: Consumers tell their favorite food companies that justice comes before brand loyalty...

Chipotle, Publix told: Give us Fair Food, or we're not coming back!

From time to time, consumers send us copies of letters they have written to their favorite food companies in which they take the corporation to task for not supporting the Fair Food Program. The letters are inevitably poignant, because when someone has spent years patronizing a restaurant or grocery store in his or her city, the bonds that develop can grow quite strong. But values are values, and when you suddenly realize that a cold, corporate heart beats behind the smiling, familiar faces at your favorite fast food hangout, everything changes.

Today we are bringing you two such letters, one to "Food with Integrity" darling Chipotle, and the other to Florida's largest grocer, Publix. Here's the first, from a Fair Food ally (who has chosen to remain nameless), responding to a Chipotle representative who answered his first inquiry with the same sort of answers we have deconstructed before on this site:

You see now why we can't help but share these letters, at least every now and then...

The second letter is from Edward R. Sunshine of Miami Shores, Florida, to Mr. Ed Crenshaw, CEO of Publix Supermarkets:

Short, sweet, and straight to the point. Letters like these arrive at the corporate headquarters of companies like Publix, Chipotle, Giant, Stop & Shop, and Kroger every day, but the vast majority are either totally ignored or answered with such a stock response that everyone would have been better off if they had saved the paper.

Well, here's what you can do to be sure that, next time, when you take up pen and paper to write to your favorite food company, someone there actually sees the letter: Send it to us! We will publish letters that are copied to us as often as we can and share them not only with the rest of the Fair Food Nation, but with the company executives who read this website everyday, too. May the mailbag be forever overflowing!...

September 10, 2012

CIW, Florida growers join forces to confront threat to Fair Food Program, hard fought labor reforms!

Third Labor Day op/ed focuses on joint efforts to protect still fragile human rights gains in the fields...

And now, for the third and final installment of our series, "Labor Day Op/Eds on the Fair Food Program," we bring you an opinion piece entitled "Threat of a New Harvest of Shame," from the Tampa Bay Times. Unlike the first two pieces, which focused on the urgent need for the supermarket industry (and the federal government) to support the Fair Food Program, this piece, penned by the CIW's own Greg Asbed, cast light on a growing threat to the unprecedented changes taking place in Florida's fields today:

After summarizing some of the complex trade issues involved in the current dispute, the piece concludes:

And with that we conclude our series of Labor Day 2012 op/eds on the CIW and the Fair Food Program. See the third installment in its entirety here, and check back again soon for more as the season slowly ramps up here at Campaign for Fair Food headquarters...

September 7, 2012

Lakeland Ledger op/ed on Fair Food Program:

"Publix has chosen the path of public relations falsehoods and corporate greed for their shareholders over doing the right thing."

Labor Day 2012 saw a tremendous outpouring of support for the Fair Food Program, in both action and words.

In our last post, we mentioned that several papers published op/eds shining a light on the Fair Food Program in recognition of Labor Day, and today we are sharing the second of three of those op/eds, this one from the Lakeland Ledger (Publix's hometown paper) entitled, "Publix Unwilling to Do Right Thing."

The Ledger piece, written by the Rev. Andy Oliver, a local United Methodist church elder, begins with a clear explanation of the direct link between Publix's profits and farmworker poverty:

From this analysis, Rev. Oliver goes on to examine Publix's refusal support the Fair Food Program, with a particular focus on the misleading statements about the Program that Publix has used in its defense:

It's a hard-hitting opinion that demands to be read. Check it out here and come back soon for the third and final Labor Day op/ed, and all the latest news from the front in the Campaign for Fair Food!

September 4, 2012

Wash Post op/ed on Fair Food Program: "The CIW model is one of the great human rights success stories of our day."

Labor Day editorials shine light on the Fair Food Program, need for supermarkets to do their part for justice!

While farmworkers and Fair Food allies were busy taking the fight for Fair Food to Publix this past Labor Day weekend, the editorial department of papers from the Washington Post to the Lakeland Ledger were sending their own message of support for the Campaign for Fair Food and the need for supermarkets to get on board without further delay.

Throughout this week we will share three Labor Day editorials that focused on the Fair Food Program, beginning today with a piece that ran in the Washington Post this past Monday entitled "Fair Food Program helps end the use of slavery in the tomato fields". It was written by Holly Burkhalter, Vice President for Government Relations at the International Justice Mission (IJM), the faith-based human rights organization dedicated to "ending violence against the poor" around the globe (loyal readers of this site may remember that IJM launched a campaign this past 4th of July in support of the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food entitled Recipe for Change).

It is a must-read analysis of the intersection between the Fair Food Program and the CIW's anti-slavery work, and how success in the fight against slavery here in the US strengthens the country's voice in its efforts to end slavery overseas. The piece calls on supermarket industry leaders to end their resistance to the Fair Food Program's historic human rights advances, and even raises a intriguing new prospect for the further expansion of those advances. The conclusion is particularly moving:

Don't miss this great editorial, and come back soon for more, as next time we see what Publix executives in the company's hometown of Lakeland, Florida, read when they opened their morning paper this past Labor Day!

September 3, 2012

Fair Food Nation drops the hammer on Publix from Tampa to Atlanta!

Multiple Labor Day protests marked by increasingly harsh tactics from Publix's anti-Fair Food response team...

Labor Day is the one time each year we stop to recognize the contributions of workers to the country's long history of economic prosperity and social progress. And what better way to celebrate than to stand with farmworkers from Immokalee in the Campaign for Fair Food, the growing movement to bring farmworkers in from the margins of society, where they have toiled for generations in grinding poverty, to share in the prosperity they have created with their undervalued labor?

Well, hundreds of consumers did just that this Labor Day weekend, joining farmworkers at Publix protests and manager letter delegations from Sarasota, Florida, to Knoxville, Tennessee, and nearly two dozen cities in between. The picture at the top of this post is from Atlanta; the picture immediately below is from a lively protest of Fair Food activists and workers in Sarasota.

But not everyone at the protests was in a celebratory mood. Publix's omnipresent anti-Fair Food response team -- the small cadre of men who, among other things, have conducted an often disturbing surveillance program since the first days of the Publix campaign, including going undercover to film CIW members' children at early protests -- were at their most bitter this weekend, harassing protesters with every trick in the book, from calling tow trucks to haul off consumers' cars to calling the police on a Presbyterian pastor who entered a store after the Sarasota protest to order a sandwich and instead was threatened with arrest and handed an order banning him from the store for a year.

But if the Publix protest surveillance squad had a favorite tactic this weekend, it had to be aggressively demanding that the religious and student allies "Name one grower who isn't paying minimum wage." The question -- posed pugnaciously as if just by asking it with enough misplaced bravado the long and well-documented history of rampant violations of minimum wage violations in the fields would somehow magically disappear -- is just so wrong that it is hard to know where to begin in addressing it.

First, the question is a remarkably brazen attempt to make a virtue out of Publix's own ignorance.

The entire premise of the Fair Food Program is to establish channels of communication (including a complaint system and a regular audit process) among workers, growers, and buyers to identify and eliminate the longstanding abuses that have plagued farm labor for generations, for the good of the industry as a whole. As part of the Program, if Code violations are found and a grower refuses to correct them, including minimum wage violations, then that grower is removed from the program and participating buyers are informed immediately, so that they can suspend purchases from the grower in question.

But Publix has refused to participate in the Fair Food Program, and so isn't informed when growers are removed from the Program. Instead of working in partnership with the Fair Food Standards Council, the very people who do the audits and can provide the answer to its question, Publix prefers to bully students and people of faith, who may not know the answer but do know that Publix isn't doing its part to end human rights violations in its supply chain.

[A note to Publix: Pestering protesters for names of growers who don't pay minimum wage when you know they can't give you an answer is the height of false courage. It does no one any good. Instead, you could show some real courage, and character, by joining the Fair Food Program. Then you would have all the information you might want. Problem solved.]

Second, the Penny per Pound premium that is the centerpiece of the Fair Food Program is designed to prevent minimum wage violations before they happen, not simply close the barn door once the horse is long gone.

Piece rates in the Florida tomato industry have remained virtually stagnant for more than 30 years, and workers are all too often not credited with all the hours they put in.  As a result, a significant percentage of workers consistently earn below minimum wage, while another large portion hover forever on the very edge of falling below the minimum. The Penny per Pound allows growers to pay workers more, lifting many workers out of the danger zone and solving the problem at its root. But Publix refuses to pay the penny and do its part to help end minimum wage violations, instead preferring to stick its head in the sand and blindly proclaim there are no violations.

Finally, when the CIW did inform Publix that the last major slavery prosecution involved farms in its supply chain, Publix did nothing for months and instead revealed what is apparently their true position: "If there are some atrocities going on, it's not our business."

Publix can't have it both ways. It can't demand to know which farms aren't paying minimum wage, implying that the company would take swift action if it were informed of violations, while simultaneously taking the position that "it's not our business" when informed of minimum wage violations -- and forced labor -- in its supply chain. Those are two logically, not to mention morally, contradictory positions. But if you want to know the company's real position, watch what it does, not what it says. At every step of the way, Publix's actions, and inactions, have spoken far louder than its words.

But let's not let the Publix surveillance squad's bad day color what was otherwise a wonderful weekend of action. Let's close, instead, on a positive note, with this great picture from a protest of nearly 100 workers and Fair Food activists in Tampa:

And with a media round-up from the weekend's actions:

• "Consumers to Picket Outside Publix for Refusal to Join Fair Food Program," West Orlando News, 8/31/12
• "Protest planned over tomato pickers' pay at local Publix," Orlando Sentinel, 8/31/12
  
• "Dozens of activists demonstrate outside Publix," Knoxville, TN, NBC-WBIR, 9/2/12
• "Farm workers picket Publix over tomato-picker wages," Tampa Bay Online, 9/3/12

And be sure to check back again this week for a number of excellent Op/Eds on the Fair Food Program that ran in several papers this Labor Day weekend -- including one by our friends at the International Justice Mission that ran in the august pages of the Washington Post!

September 1, 2012

Turning up the heat on Chipotle...

"Fair Food Fridays" wrap up in Philly, but pressure won't let up in the fall; Rabbis for Human Rights - North America says "Now the focus is on Chipotle"!

With Chipotle's "Cultivate" Festival -- and the CIW's alternative Fair Food Festival -- now just two weeks away, and with the advance team of CIW members and allies already in place laying the groundwork for what should be an exciting event in the Windy City, the pressure is picking up on the self-styled "Food with Integrity" leader throughout the Fair Food nation.

In Philadelphia, where the dogged members of Philly Fair Food have held weekly lunch hour protests at local Chipotle restaurants throughout the summer (a little thing they liked to call "Fair Food Fridays"), the summer series of protests wrapped up with a lively picket (above) and manager delegation yesterday. Here's how they framed their Friday protest campaign:

This unrelenting campaign of protests led by students, parents, faith leaders and burrito-lovers resulted in the delivery of over 100 manager letters by disillusioned Chipotle patrons. Week after week, the group returned to convey their message: "Food with Integrity" that dismisses worker participation, lacks transparency and rejects commitment to verifiable enforcement actually has no integrity at all.

Now that the summer's over and Fair Food Fridays are a wrap, are the Philly Fair Food lovers turning down the heat on Chipotle? Hardly! Here's the message after Friday's protest on their facebook page:

Meanwhile, another great CIW partner, the Rabbis for Human Rights -- North America, is leading the Jewish community across the country in the fight against modern-day slavery, and a key arrow in their quiver is their support for the Campaign for Fair Food. RHR-NA played a leading role in the Trader Joe's campaign, and now, in an interview with RHR-NA Director Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster, it is clear that they will be turning their considerable clout on Chipotle:

But not too big a challenge the RHR-NA, or the Campaign for Fair Food! Check back soon for more news from Chicago as the advance team meets with student, faith, and community allies ahead of the big Cultivate Festival action this Sept. 15.

August 29, 2012

What are you doing -- for workers -- this Labor Day?...

Join the Publix Labor Day of Action this weekend and take a stand for farmworkers' rights!

In Homestead, Florida, a delegation of farmworker women and their children will be visiting a local Publix to convey their support for the CIW's Fair Food Program. In Miami, a student delegation, led by the new Student/Farmworker Alliance chapter at Florida International University, will deliver letters penned and signed by individual students and campus organizations calling on Publix to do its part for Fair Food. In Gainesville, three different congregations are planning manager delegations over Labor Day weekend, launching a program they are calling "Adopt-a-Publix," where congregations adopt their nearest store in order to visit management, organize pickets, and offer their prayers for farm labor justice in the company's tomato supply chain.

Meanwhile, in Atlanta, Georgia, Emory University students are organizing an action this weekend (Publix's Charlie Jenkins sits on the board of Emory University, just by the way...). And in Knoxville, Tennessee, they are planning a protest at the newest Publix store opened there on the very edge of the Florida-based grocery giant's market.

Those are just a few of the actions planned for this weekend. What are you doing this weekend to support farmworkers rights?

Click here to learn more about the upcoming Publix Labor Day of Action and how you can do your part to bring the Fair Food Program to the workers who pick Publix's tomatoes!

August 27, 2012

Florida Clergy to Publix: "Lack of respect for... workers who harvest the tomatoes you sell is inexplicable."

An impressive interfaith alliance of 43 religious leaders from the Gainesville area have signed a letter urging Publix to join the CIW's Fair Food Program without further delay. The letter reads in part:

The religious leaders express their disappointment with Publix for the company's "lack of respect for and continued refusal to meet with the workers who harvest the tomatoes you sell," and conclude by saying:

At a press conference in Gainesville last week to publicize the letter, one of the founders of the Gainesville alliance added a poignant reminder for the leaders of Florida's "neighborhood grocer". From the Gainesville Sun report:

The Gainesville religious leaders join a growing list of clergy and lay people who are coming together through the Campaign for Fair Food to demand justice from Florida's largest grocer, a demand deeply rooted in their faith and embraced by Christian, Jewish, and Muslim congregations across the state of Florida. A similar letter was signed and published by a group of 15 religious leaders from Tallahassee earlier this year, and interfaith religious support was the heart and soul of this past spring's Fast for Fair Food outside Publix headquarters in Lakeland.

The Faith Moves Mountains Campaign, launched last January in support of the Campaign for Fair Food, is perhaps the most eloquent projection of this growing movement. Check out the video below, and go here to see a few ideas on how you can get involved through your local religious community:

August 21, 2012

Chipotle's food movement charm offensive will not go unanswered!

CIW, Fair Food activists to attend Chipotle's upcoming "Cultivate" festivals in Chicago, Denver, highlight company's "Chipocrisy" when it comes to human rights...

On September 15th, Chipotle Mexican Grill will hold the second annual "Cultivate Festival" in Lincoln Park, Chicago. The day-long festival -- "bringing together food, farmers, chefs, artisans, thought leaders, and musicians" -- is a celebration of Chipotle's self-proclaimed holistic commitment to "food with integrity." Three weeks later, the festival moves to Denver, Chipotle's hometown, and it happens all over again.

The Cultivate festivals are all part of a concerted outreach effort by Chipotle to distance itself from the image of a traditional fast-food company and to woo the country's growing "Good Food" movement. As Chipotle CEO Steve Ells said in a recent article about the shift in the company's marketing strategy ("Chipotle shifts marketing approach, reports 8% comps increase," fastcasual.com, 7/23/12):

Despite Chipotle's claim to be the fast-food leader in social accountability, the burgeoning restaurant chain has for many years now refused to sign a Fair Food Agreement, an agreement four other leading fast-food companies signed long ago, including McDonald's, Chipotle's former parent company. By signing a Fair Food Agreement, Chipotle would be joining the CIW's Fair Food Program, the only social accountability program of its kind that combines worker-to-worker education, a complaint mechanism with protection against retaliation, and a third-party monitoring organization that investigates and resolves complaints as well as carries out regular field and farm office audits to measure compliance with the Fair Food Code of Conduct.

The entire Fair Food Program is enforced through the exercise of market consequences if a farm fails to comply with the Code. The market consequences are required by the Fair Food Agreements signed by participating retail food corporations, in which the companies have agreed to curtail purchases from growers unwilling to comply with the Code. Chipotle's refusal to sign an Agreement means it is under no obligation, much less verifiable obligation, to stop buying tomatoes from growers where workers' rights are being violated.

So, on September 15th, the CIW and allies will head to the Cultivate Festival in Chicago to show Chipotle that promoting itself as sustainable is not enough - it must include workers' rights, and workers themselves, in its vision of a food system that claims to be based on integrity.

Fair Food activists are planning a series of creative actions inside the festival - creating a festival within a festival of sorts - to unveil the truth behind Chipotle's marketing. Combining prayer, theater, music, and a few surprises, the counter-festival will highlight the contradiction between the attention Chipotle pays to sustainable meat and animal welfare, on the one hand, while, on the other hand, simultaneously refusing to partner with the CIW in the Fair Food Program, the program for real social responsibility that is today changing the pervasive poverty and powerlessness of the farmworkers who pick Florida tomatoes.

If you live in the Chicago or Denver areas and would like to get involved in the Fair Food activities during the upcoming Cultivate festivals, you can email organizers at Interfaith Action of Southwest Florida.

August 16, 2012

Labor Day celebrated the right way...

Fair Food activists ramping up for a Labor Day of Action with Publix protests across southeast market states!

This Labor Day weekend, a weekend in which we honor the contributions of workers to our society, Fair Food activists across the southern states that make up Publix's market -- from Homestead to Sarasota in Florida to Nashville, Atlanta, and more -- are taking action to support the men and women who harvest Florida's tomatoes!

For years, Publix has refused to join companies like Trader Joe's, Whole Foods, Burger King, McDonalds and others in supporting the CIW's Fair Food Program. This Labor Day weekend, you can join with people from your school, congregation or community group to call on Publix to join the Fair Food Program and do its part to support the groundbreaking collaboration among workers, growers, and purchasers that is changing wages and working conditions in Florida's fields today.

If you wish to join in the Labor Day Weekend of Action, please contact the folks at Interfaith Action of Southwest Florida by emailing jordan@interfaithact.org or calling 239-986-9101. They'll let you know of any plans already underway in your area, supply you a template press release in order to publicize your action, and do whatever else they can to ensure that your action is a success. And don't forget to take pictures for a photo report on the CIW website!

And, just in case you need a pinch of additional motivation to get you over the hump and into action, have a look at the video from Day Six of this past spring's Fast for Fair Food:

Fast for Fair Food: The Ones We've Been Waiting For 3-10-2012 from Coalition of Immokalee Workers

August 13, 2012

CIW, Food for Maine's Future join forces for Maine's 2012 blueberry harvest...

Maine's family farm movement, Florida's farmworker movement work together to build bridge between local community and farmworkers in rural Maine

Maine has many claims to fame -- delicious lobsters, breathtaking landscapes and majestic rocky coastlines chief among them -- but for many, the state's short-bush blueberry harvest is first and foremost on the list of things that make Maine one of this country's most beautiful states. The children's classic Blueberries for Sal has introduced millions of young people to the charms of the state's late summer berry bounty, raising the wild-growing fruit to almost mythic proportions.

But, as with many myths, the reality can be even more interesting than the legend. And the reality is that most Maine blueberries are harvested today by crews that have traveled the length of the map from the fields of Florida to the forests of the Pine Tree State at the northernmost stop along the East Coast migrant stream. And this year, a delegation from the CIW traveled that same route, too, invited by allies with the state's small farmer movement, Food for Maine's Future.

Food for Maine's Future "seeks to build a just, secure, sustainable and democratic food system to the benefit of all Maine's farmers, fisheries, communities, and the environment." In recognition of their years of hard work toward the realization of that vision, Food for Maine's Future received the 2012 World Hunger Year Harry Chapin Self-Reliance Award. And this past spring, one of FMF's founders, small farmer and fair food activist Bob St. Peter (right), joined CIW members and allies in Lakeland for the Fast for Fair Food, fasting all six days with the core fasting crew.

So when Food For Maine's Future invited us to join them in reaching out to Maine's seasonal farmworker community during this season's blueberry harvest, we didn't hesitate for a moment. A small delegation from the CIW headed north last week and, together with Bob and other Blue Hill area family farmers (including the incredible Retberg family that runs Quills End Farm in Penobscot), we immediately set about organizing a community/farmworker dinner at an old Grange hall in town. When a week later over 75 people walked through the door, the vast majority of them Florida farmworkers, the dinner was a huge success. A delicious, fresh meal from Bob's farm set the tone for an evening of community building, and the gathering sowed the seeds for an even closer relationship in the years to come, as many of the blueberry workers make the trip to Maine year after year.

In between outreach efforts, the CIW delegation lent its labor to local farms throughout the week, including a misty morning of blueberry harvesting (above) with the crew pictured at the top of this post, who had made their way to Maine from Ft. Pierce, Florida. Though the professional blueberry crew outpaced the CIW members in raw output, the CIW's years of experience in the watermelon harvest ensured that they didn't embarrass themselves too badly, and won them an invitation to return next season to harvest berries in earnest.

Keep an eye on this unique collaboration of small farmers and farmworkers in the years ahead. When two groups like Food for Maine's Future and the CIW join together to fight for fundamental change in a food system that has undervalued labor for generations -- whether that labor is provided by a farmworker or the owner of a family-run farm -- they form a force that must be reckoned with.

August 10, 2012

Another new Publix store, another protest and petition in support of Fair Food!

Workers, allies deliver 600 signatures to managers of new Publix store in North Ft. Myers, FL...

This past weekend, workers from Immokalee joined with allies from the Southwest Florida region to deliver a message from the Campaign for Fair Food to the managers of Florida's newest Publix supermarket. From the CBS news affiliate:

You can find local media coverage of the protest, including video, here and here.

August 7, 2012

Author Michael Pollan: "The Fair Food Program can help eradicate slavery from the tomato supply chain in our country - if we can get supermarkets to sign on."

International Justice Mission's "Recipe for Change" campaign gaining high profile support, grassroots momentum by the day; IJM calls for National Day of Action this September 1st!

This past July 4th, faith-based human rights organization International Justice Mission launched a summer campaign in support of the CIW’s Campaign for Fair Food, entitled Recipe for Change.

The campaign features weekly tomato-based recipes from food justice leaders and raises awareness about the continued struggle to eliminate exploitation and forced labor in Florida agriculture. Most importantly, it offers ways to take action -- including a Recipe for Change National Day of Action on September 1st, which promises to be huge -- to encourage supermarket leaders Publix, Kroger, and Ahold to do their part to eradicate modern-day slavery and the conditions of poverty and powerlessness that enable it to exist by joining the Fair Food Program.

IJM's Recipe for Change has generated a veritable buzz in the month since its inception.

New York Times food columnist and best-selling author Mark Bittman was one of the first food movement luminaries to lend his voice to the campaign, sharing his bruschetta recipe.

This past week, Helen Fabela Chavez, wife of farmworker movement legend Cesar Chavez, submitted a recipe of her own, writing:

And most recently, Michael Pollan -- author of four New York Times bestsellers: Food Rules: An Eater’s Manual (2010); In Defense of Food: An Eater’s Manifesto (2008); The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (2006) and The Botany of Desire: A Plant’s-Eye View of the World (2001) -- added his own recipe for change to the mix:

August 2, 2012

"You allow it or they fire you..."

Nely Rodriguez of the CIW (middle) looks on as Rabbi Brian Schuldenfrei (right) of Miami attempts to persuade a Publix representative of the urgency of the human rights crisis in Florida's fields and the importance of Publix's support for the groundbreaking new human rights standards established by the CIW's Fair Food Program -- including strict prohibitions against sexual harassment backed by real and immediate market consequences -- during April's Fast for Fair Food. Rabbi Brian's efforts fell on deaf ears, as one Publix representative recently proclaimed "We are not in agreement with fair food," which would require the grocery giant to curtail purchases from suppliers found to be violating their workers' fundamental human rights.

Recent sexual harassment settlement underscores severity of problem in the fields; New brief on the Fair Food Program's approach demonstrates power of worker participation, market consequences in curbing abuse.

An article in the Miami Herald on the recent EEOC settlement for sexual harassment charges at a major Florida tomato grower ("Women farm workers win sex harassment case") reminds readers -- including tens of thousands of Publix customers and, surely, not a few Publix decision makers -- of the harrowing and humiliating conditions faced by all too many female farmworkers in Florida's fields for decades:

July 30, 2012

Farmworker mothers march on Publix!

Plus... Chipotle Day of Action keeps making news across the country.

Carrying hundreds of signatures on a petition calling on Publix to join the CIW's Fair Food Program, farmworker mothers from Immokalee and their children joined with Southwest Florida allies for a Mothers' March on Publix this past Saturday. Check out the article in the Ft. Myers News-Press, including a picture gallery from the protest, for a sense of the action, which came, significantly, in the wake of one of the most important blows to the scourge of sexual harassment in the fields in years.

Meanwhile, last week's huge Chipotle International Day of Action just keeps on generating interest in the press. Here's a quick list of links to, and excerpts from, some the very latest press that didn't make Friday's big round-up:

• "CIW allies in Columbus and Cincinnati join Chipotle national day of action," examiner.com, 7/27/12:
  
  

  "... During the protest, a delegation from Ohio Fair Food entered the restaurant to speak with the manager, who was not available. Katie, a marketing associate from the Chipotle regional office, spoke for several minutes with the four delegates. "We had an extensive conversation with her about who we are and our expectations for Chipotle," said Ohio Fair Food organizer Rubén Castilla Herrera. "Chipotle markets itself as Food with Integrity," Herrera said. "What we've been asking them to do is have the integrity to sign the fair food agreement. "The big challenge for corporations is that they don't want to deal with the people on the ground—the farm workers themselves," he said. "There's no transparency. Without a fair food agreement, there's no way to verify that Chipotle is living up to their slogan." read more

  
  
• "Should the food movement push for better jobs too?," grist.org, 7/27/12:
  
  

  "U.K. resident and activist Bethan Tichborne wants to see the fast food giant Chipotle sign an agreement to treat farmworkers fairly, so she organized to create an international component of a U.S.-based Day of Action to get Chipotle’s attention earlier this week. “We found out on Monday that Chipotle has plans to expand in the U.K.,” says Tichborne. “So we’re pretty pleased that by Wednesday we had a people from all around the country handing out several hundred leaflets at one of the three already existing branches in London! … We had a great response from passers-by and most of the customers that we spoke to. Some said they would think twice before eating there again.” Tichborne was joined by several hundred students, activists, and other conscious consumers, who gathered in 25 American cities in support of a group of Florida tomato workers organizing for improved wages and labor conditions. The target was Chipotle, the fast food chain known for a comparatively progressive approach to sourcing its food (the company uses meat raised without antibiotics, and sources at least some of its produce from local and organic sources). Activists — led by the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) and the nonprofit group Just Harvest — are demanding that Chipotle join 10 other fast food restaurants, food service companies, and grocery stores, including McDonald’s, Taco Bell, Burger King, Subway, Trader Joe’s, and Whole Foods, in signing onto the CIW Fair Food Program..." read more

  
  
• "Protestan a nivel nacional contra Chipotle," El Diario, New York, 7/26/12

July 27, 2012

From coast to coast, the reports are in...

The message is loud and clear:

Stop the Chipocrisy, start working with the CIW in a real, verifiable, and respectful partnership for human rights in your tomato supply chain -- now!

One thing we've learned from more than a decade of the Campaign for Fair Food is that ignoring your customers is never a winning strategy. Neither is trying to trick them.

People demanding a change whose time has come don't go away just because you turn your back on them. Nor do they fall for half measures or paternalistic reassurances that, though they may not agree or even understand, their concerns are in fact being heard and addressed.

The history of movements for human rights -- of movements to end the systematic exploitation, humiliation, and abuse of one class of human beings by another -- shows us that efforts by the exploiter to detain or delay progress are, ultimately, futile. In the words of Dr. King's far more eloquent formulation, "How long? Not long! Because the arc of the moral universe is long, but it bends towards justice."

This week, a new chapter is being written in that history, through the ever-expanding campaign calling on Chipotle to live up to its claims of sustainability, to recognize farmworkers as partners in its success, and to join the CIW's Fair Food Program to eliminate human rights abuses in Florida's tomato fields. And the authors of this latest chapter are a growing wave of Fair Food activists that took to the streets this week in 25 cities across the country -- and across the Atlantic Ocean, in London, England -- to take the fight to Chipotle.

The protests' message was captured in a quote from Gerardo Reyes of the CIW:

And echoed in a quote by Karen Dwyer, a Fair Food activist speaking to National Public Radio about the Chipotle protest in Naples, Florida:

But, ultimately, it was best expressed in over two dozen protests in signs, chants and one-to-one exchanges with Chipotle customers and managers at Chipotle restaurants across the country. Here below are a few of the first-hand reports from some of the actions:

There are many, many more reports that have made their way into the CIW already, and many more to come, so check back soon for a complete round-up when all the actions are a wrap next week.

Finally, we have the message as conveyed in the media. Perhaps the very best story on the protests came, not surprisingly, from the food movement blog civileats.com in a piece that covered the action at a Chipotle restaurant in Oakland entitled, "Taking on Chipotle with the Campaign for Fair Food". Here's an excerpt:

We send you into your weekend with a collection of all the media links from the Day of Action protests:

July 26, 2012

Chipotle National International
Day of Action a huge success!

A Fair Food Activist with the Workers Defense Project flyers outside a Chipotle restaurant in Austin, Texas. Actions are being held in over two dozen cities, including Chipotle's newest front for expansion, London, England.

The action has started in dozens of cities in what has become an International Day of Action to demand that Chipotle -- the self-styled "Food with Integrity" leader -- live up to its claims of sustainability, recognize farmworkers as partners in its success, and join the CIW's Fair Food Program.

Photos and reports are streaming into CIW headquarters, so check back soon for a complete report and media round-up from the growing campaign calling on Chipotle to sign a Fair Food Agreement today. In the meantime, we leave you with an excerpt from an excellent article on the Huffington Post now, by Rabbi Rachel Kahn-Troster, entitled, "Integrity and Justice: Tell Chipotle to Go Deeper than Just a Slogan". Enjoy!:

July 23, 2012

EEOC announces settlement in major sexual harassment case...

In early 2009, two women walked into the CIW office complaining of some truly horrific conditions at an Immokalee tomato farm, one of the largest tomato growers in Florida. Here, excerpted from a story on last week's settlement of the EEOC charges stemming from their complaint, are some of the details of their story:

Many more details emerged, most of them too vile to repeat here. But suffice it to say that, even by the dismally low standards of the fields, the picture of a hostile workplace painted by the women was exceptional for its harshness and depravity.

Continue reading this post >>

July 17, 2012

Publix: "We are not in agreement with Fair Food"

Nashville consumers: Well, you better think again, if you plan to expand in our community...

A funny thing happened at a Nashville Publix protest the other day... actually, at two recent Nashville Publix protests.

In keeping with its strategy of aggressive response to peaceful consumer actions -- including the surveillance and shadowing of Fair Food activists -- Publix actually dispatched representatives from its corporate headquarters in Lakeland, Florida, to travel seven hundred miles north to Nashville, Tennessee, just to monitor and deflect consumers gathered there in peaceful protest to call on Publix to do the right thing and sign a Fair Food agreement.

Nashville Fair Food is a local coalition of community, student and faith groups determined to send Florida's supermarket giant this simple message (from Nashville's News Channel 5's coverage of last week's protest):

To that end, Nashville Fair Food organized the two recent actions as part of an ongoing monthly series of protests designed to bring awareness to their neighbors on the ethical shortcomings of the grocery chain that hopes to win their loyalty and patronage.

In an excellent blog post that includes a must-see video from the latest action, Nashville Fair Food members report:

Leaving aside the absurdity of the Publix rep's statement (Which part, exactly, of "Fair Food" does the company not agree with? Access to clean drinking water and shade? Transparent mechanisms for addressing and eliminating sexual harassment and violence in the fields? Third-party oversight?), Publix's over-the-top behavior in response to two local, peaceful demonstrations is telling.

After all, in the words of Tristan Call of Nashville Fair Food, mid-Tennessee "is supposed to be brimming with eagerly-awaiting customers. Not demonstrators concerned over labor conditions in the fields where Publix sources their tomatoes." Publix has meticulously crafted a certain image; having people tell the truth about Publix's stubborn refusal to support the Fair Food Program, and the possible reasons for this refusal, calls this image into question.

It doesn't have to be this way. Publix could seize the opportunity to join in the Fair Food Program and distinguish itself as a leader in the supermarket industry. But until that happens, Publix can expect more of the same in Nashville and beyond, because consumers are no longer content to remain silent as Publix claims to be a good corporate neighbor while turning its back on the very workers, and neighbors, that make is vast wealth possible.

And with that, we'll give the last word to our friends in Nashville:

July 12, 2012

Recipe for Change: International Justice Mission unveils new justice campaign in partnership with the CIW to "push major supermarket chains" to support the Fair Food Program!

International Justice Mission (IJM), a faith-based human rights organization dedicated to ending "violence against the poor" around the globe, launched a new campaign this past 4th of July right here at home in support of the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food entitled Recipe for Change.

For those of you not yet familiar with IJM, here is an excerpt from their website that should give you a pretty good idea of who they are:

In keeping with those Core Commitments, IJM has put together a unique new campaign to help encourage supermarket leaders like Publix, Kroger, Ahold, and Walmart to join the Fair Food Program and do their part to make real, sustainable justice for farmworkers possible. And IJM's efforts have caught the attention of some of the leading figures of the food justice movement, including NY Times food writer Mark Bittman and best selling author Michael Pollan, who have contributed their favorite tomato recipes to the Recipe for Change website to add a little spice to the campaign!

You can be part of IJM's exciting new campaign by visiting their website today, where you'll find several great ways to take action, including:

• Sending a message to supermarket CEO's asking them to join the Fair Food Program;
  
  
• Downloading a petition to circulate in your own community, church, or school and deliver to your local supermarket;
  
  
• and joining the Recipe for Change facebook community to keep abreast of all the latest news and developments.

So check out the Recipe for Change website today, and join tens of thousands of other lovers of justice across the country and around the globe in calling on the supermarket industry to step up and support the Fair Food Program today!

July 9, 2012

Anything but a wild goose chase...

CIW takes the Campaign for Fair Food to the 2012 Wild Goose Festival in the Shakori Hills of North Carolina!

Late last month, the CIW ventured to the Shakori Hills of North Carolina for the 2012 Wild Goose Festival, a four-day gathering in the forest of people from around the country exploring the intersections of justice, spirituality, music and art. In this spirit, the CIW and allies from Interfaith Action packed up their tents, sleeping bags and 153 tomato buckets in order to illustrate to Wild Goose attendees the amount of tomatoes a farmworker must pick in order to make minimum wage in a 10-hour day.

The exhibit, at first simply composed of the buckets scattered across the ground, inspired many conversations throughout Wild Goose. The very first visitors were a pair of elementary-school aged girls, who wanted to know what "the red tubs were for." When we explained that they are used by farmworkers to gather tomatoes, one girl told us that when she was younger she had protested with her family in Philadelphia against Burger King for not treating farmworkers right.

We explained that due to her and others' efforts across the country, the nation's largest fast food and food-service companies, Burger King included, are doing their part to ensure that farmworkers are treated more fairly, and that now we are calling on the supermarkets to follow their lead.

Several able organizers from International Justice Mission, whose table was situated adjacent to our tomato buckets, engaged passersby throughout the weekend in their new summer campaign, Recipe for Change. The campaign -- which includes, among other things, weekly tomato recipes supplied by prominent figures from the ever-expanding food movement, including writers like Mark Bittman and Michael Pollan -- runs from the 4th of July until Labor Day and encourages participants to urge supermarket giants Kroger, Publix, Stop and Shop and Giant to sign on to the Fair Food Program.

But word of the struggle for farmworker justice spread far beyond the installation. One evening, longtime CIW supporter and a founder of The Simple Way community, Shane Claiborne, discussed the Campaign for Fair Food in a conversation entitled “Political Misfits and Holy Troublemakers”. Another morning, prominent Christian author Brian McLaren led a large group prayer using a tomato bucket. He asked participants to reflect on stories of exile in the Bible, sparking a conversation about how people in modern society, such as farmworkers, are exiled – not just geographically, but also economically and socially.

All in all, the Wild Goose Festival was a huge success, inspiring a host of conversations about farmworker justice, and calling more to action in the Campaign for Fair Food.

July 5, 2012

For your four-day weekend listening pleasure...
A modern-day freedom song!

Fair Food troubadour extraordinaire, Liz Fitzgerald, has penned a pithy response to Chipotle's much-ballyhooed commercial short, Back to the Start (ballyhooed despite the fact that Chipotle's idyllic vision of agriculture-as-it-should-be is totally devoid of actual farmworkers, a fact that escaped the attention of all but the most eagle-eyed critics). Liz shot her own short video, above, outside a San Francisco Chipotle restaurant, to the approval of hundreds of passersby who took in a decidedly different message about Chipotle and its definition of "food with integrity."

Your move, Mr. Willie Nelson...

Continue reading this post >>

July 2, 2012

Ohio allies urge Kroger to join Fair Food Program at annual shareholder meeting...

Members of Ohio Fair Food and the Cincinnati Interfaith Workers Center demonstrate outside
Kroger's 2012 Shareholder Meeting in Cincinnati.

Late last month in Cincinnati, Kroger executives and shareholders gathered in the company's hometown for the 2012 Kroger shareholder meeting amid a tide of rising profits for the country's second largest grocery chain.

A group of over 75 consumers and farmworker allies -- including members of Ohio Fair Food, the Cincinnati Interfaith Workers Center (CIWC) and other organizations and congregations -- braved the sweltering June heat for a lively picket drawing attention to Kroger's ongoing refusal to join the Fair Food Program...

Continue reading this post >>

June 26, 2012

"I applaud these retailers who are concerned about the human condition..."

Respected food industry analyst lauds Fair Food Program

This month's edition of Food, Nutrition & Science — a monthly newsletter for food industry insiders with a readership upwards of 26,000 — prominently features a concise but far-reaching article on the Fair Food Program and the role of the supermarket industry in perpetuating — and potentially alleviating — farmworker poverty and abuse...

Continue reading this post >>

June 18, 2012

"Because there's vigilance now"

New article highlights role of Fair Food Standards Council in cultivating new human rights standards for Florida tomatoes...

Retired New York State Supreme Court Judge Laura Safer Espinoza, Director, Fair Food Standards Council

As the Florida tomato growing season draws to a close, the Fort Myers News-Press yesterday published an exhaustive front-page article detailing the efforts of the Sarasota-based Fair Food Standards Council (FFSC) in monitoring the provisions of the Fair Food Program in fields across the state.

The article describes not only the groundbreaking advances and improvements in farmworker wages and working conditions set in motion in the Fair Food Program's recently concluded inaugural season, but also notes the benefits for growers, as well as the challenges that remain in order to solidify and deepen those changes. Farmworker Chepe Orozco describes the new day dawning in Florida's fields:...

Continue reading this post >>

June 11, 2012

"Cultivating Fear": Human Rights Watch releases withering report on the "high risk of sexual violence, harassment faced by farmworkers in the U.S."

Last month, Human Rights Watch published a landmark report on sexual harassment and violence in the fields. It is a valuable document that recounts, in stark language, the world of abuse and humiliation that faces women who have to work in the fields in order to put food on their families' tables. Here is an excerpt from the press release announcing the report:

Continue reading this post >>

June 7, 2012

Fair Food Feedback: 65,000 people call on Chipotle to sign agreement with CIW now in massive email campaign! Comments offer some food for thought...

CIW members join Fair Food activists in New York City this past weekend for a lively protest outside a Chipotle restaurant in Manhattan. The protest was organized in conjunction with allies at ROC-New York.

The Top Ten List of Falsehoods, Fibs, and Fabrications in Chipotle's Answer to a Customer's Email about the Campaign for Fair Food is a wrap, but during its two-month run the fine folks at sumofus.org ran a companion email campaign through which Fair Food activists around the country could send Chipotle CEO Steve Ells a message demanding that the burrito king quit stalling on farm labor justice. The email text read:

65,000 people ended up sending emails to Mr. Ells, but not all were satisfied with sending the generic text. Scores of people added their own personal messages to Chipotle's CEO, and they were, taken together, a powerful expression of consumer discontent with the food system's indifference to unconscionable farm labor conditions at the bottom of their supply chains. We have compiled just a few of the messages to share with you here today...

Continue reading this post >>

June 3, 2012

#1 is done: Chipotle countdown a wrap!

Chipotle changes its tune... but the public just keeps on singing the same song!

When we first launched the Top Ten List of Falsehoods, Fibs, and Fabrications in Chipotle's Answer to a Customer's Email about the Campaign for Fair Food, we had planned, after nine weeks of meticulously deconstructing Chipotle's misleading missive, to end on a somewhat lighthearted note. But then Chipotle went and changed its response to questions about the Campaign for Fair Food, and the company's new answer -- though in many ways an implicit admission of the first email's outrageous overreaching -- requires its own rejoinder.

[For those of you who might be curious, the original idea for #1 on the countdown was a post about Chipotle's mistaken identification of Immokalee as a county in Florida (Immokalee is in fact an unincorporated community, one of the country's poorest towns), underscoring the irony that, in an email in which Chipotle asks its customers to believe that the burrito king understands farmworker reality better than the workers themselves do, the company can't even accurately locate Immokalee on a map...]

Chipotle's new response to inquiries about the Campaign is a trimmer, decidedly more humble explanation of its refusal to sign a Fair Food Agreement. Gone are the company's risible claims of having single-handedly reformed the Florida tomato industry (#'s 4 and 5 on the List), its declaration of longstanding support for the CIW (#6), its contention that the CIW is seeking to control its entire supply chain (#9). And, on balance, that's good. At least someone has been reading the List these past two months.

But the new response introduces a twist that simply cannot go unchallenged.

Continue reading this post >>

May 28, 2012

Another Lakeland community leader takes a stand, calls on Publix to join Fair Food Program!

The Rev. Andy Oliver, a United Methodist Elder from Lakeland, pens a powerful reflection on Publix and supply chain accountability, or "What Publix can learn from Apple"...

Despite Publix's almost iconic status in Lakeland, the central Florida community where the $28 billion grocery giant was founded back in 1930, more and more community leaders are taking a critical look at their hometown supermarket and finding it wanting when it comes to the treatment of farmworkers in its supply chain.

The latest such expression of disappointment with the Lakeland-based chain comes from the Rev. Andy Oliver, a United Methodist Elder who preached for some time at one of Lakeland's biggest churches. Rev. Oliver compares Publix's response to the Campaign for Fair Food to computer giant Apple's response to allegations of worker abuse at Foxconn, the Chinese factory where its iphones, ipods, and ipads are produced. He begins by describing Apple's decision to launch an investigation in to the complaints at Foxconn and the position taken by Apple CEO Tim Cook who, "welcomed the report and agreed to support its recommendations." He quoted the Apple CEO -- "We think empowering workers and helping them understand their rights is essential" -- and gave Apple "kudos... for investigating all the way down the supply chain, even if it might cut into their profit margin. This is a game changer that I hope will not only change Foxconn, but factories in the rest of China and the world."

Then he turns to Publix. After describing the "deplorable" labor conditions in Florida's fields, and expressing his frustration with Publix's decision to spread disinformation about the Campaign for Fair Food through a "whisper campaign" employing local surrogates rather than address those conditions, he concludes:

It is a must-read article, which you can find in its entirety here. Don't miss it.

May 24, 2012

National poll shows strong consumer support for fair wages for farmworkers!

Gerardo Reyes of the CIW comments on
the new WK Kellogg Foundation poll

Plus... Check out the CIW's comments at last week's Natural Resources Defense Council Food Justice Award Ceremony!

This week, hundreds of representatives of community organizations, national coalitions, advocacy groups, authors, and activists from across the national food movement gathered in Asheville, North Carolina for the annual W.K. Kellogg Foundation's Food and Community Conference. As part of the kick-off to the 2012 conference, Kellogg released the findings of a nationwide poll of consumer sentiment around several of the key demands of the growing food justice movement.

Continue reading this post >>

May 17, 2012

Natural Resources Defense Council Awards CIW the 2012 Growing Green Food Justice Award!



Lucas Benitez, Greg Asbed of CIW accept award in ceremony at San Francisco's Palace of Fine Arts

From the NRDC press release announcing this year's winners of the Going Green Awards:

We will have more from last night's ceremony soon, including photos and the text of the CIW's remarks, but for now we have a video (above) produced by NRDC with a short profile of all of the 2012 Going Green Award winners, and a few links (below) for some context on the awards. Be sure to check back soon for a complete update!

• "Sowing Justice in the Florida Tomato Fields," Barry Estabrook, 5/16/12, onearth.org
  
  
• "Field Notes on Food Justice: Why Your Local Grocery Store Makes Farmworkers Poor," Greg Asbed, Lucas Benitez, 5/16/12, onearth.org
  
  
• "Growing Green Awards: Winners Produce Food that Nourishes People and the Planet," 5/16/12, Frances Beinecke, switchboard.nrdc.org
  
  
• "Coalition of Immokalee Workers gets award for work in realm of 'food justice'," 5/16/12, Ft. Myers News Press

The CIW is humbled to have been chosen for this tremendous honor and looks forward to working more closely with the NRDC in the future in building a food industry -- healthy, sustainable, and fair -- for the 21st century.

May 12, 2012

This Mother's Day, stand with farmworker moms as they fight for their families...

Take action with change.org by telling Publix to sign a Fair Food Agreement today!

Take a moment to consider two videos. We'll begin with the 2012 Publix Mother's Day commercial (spoiler alert -- get your tissues ready):

Continue reading this post and take action with change.org >>

May 10, 2012

Evangelicals for Social Action publish must-read article on Campaign for Fair Food!

Prism Magazine: "Field hands, faith groups, and ordinary citizens are demanding justice from an industry that squeezes the lifeblood from its workers."

A great new, in-depth look at the situation of farmworkers and the Campaign for Fair Food is the cover story in this month's Prism Magazine, the publication of Evangelicals for Social Action. It is a must-read article that you can find here in pdf form. Here's an excerpt, describing the first of what would become many pray-ins at Publix, which took place just ahead last fall's bike tour to Publix headquarters in Lakeland:

Continue reading this post >>

May 8, 2012

Left behind...

Students at Lakeland's George Jenkins High (named after the founder of the Publix supermarket chain) experience the weight of a full tomato bucket during the visit of the Modern-Day Slavery Museum to the school last month.

Things can get a little hectic in the Campaign for Fair Food and, as a result, every now and then we look around and realize that we have allowed a number of great stories fall by the wayside while we try to keep up with all the day-to-day happenings. And so today, in order that those stories do not molder away forever under stacks of the very latest news at Campaign headquarters, we are debuting an update that will appear from time to time in these pages that we call "Left Behind".

Continue reading this post >>

May 4, 2012

Kids say the darndest things... about Publix!

Some middle school ESOL students on the west coast of Florida share their thoughts on Fair Food with Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw...

The letters from middle school students to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw below speak -- loudly and clearly -- for themselves. We have nothing to add to their perfect eloquence, except this: If we, as grown-ups, could hold on to just one thing from our childhood that would make this world a much, much better place, it would be the crystalline vision of justice children enjoy that we somehow learn to adulterate, so to speak, as we grow older.

And, now, without further ado, some advice from middle schoolers to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw:

May 3, 2012

New film on farm labor and reforms wrought by CIW's Fair Food Program in the works...

See how you can help wrap up production!

There have been several high profile studies of the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food of late, beginning with Barry Estabrook's "Tomatoland" and continuing, most recently, with the US premiere of the Canadian documentary "Payback" at the Tribeca Film Festival last week.

Continue reading this post >>

May 1, 2012

CIW bucket pyramid installation draws attention at popular Lakeland art festival...

including some unwanted attention from Publix's omnipresent surveillance team...

Here's an interesting story from last weekend...

At the suggestion of a member of the board of the Polk Arts Alliance -- who had joined us for the culminating march of the Fast for Fair Food -- the CIW submitted an application for Lakeland's wildly popular Platform Art Party, a festive downtown "showcase of the city's emerging talent in visual arts, film, fashion, sound and performance art."

Sounds great, right? A creative way to get the Fair Food message out to the community in Lakeland (Publix's hometown) and an opportunity to reach a whole new audience. What could possibly go wrong?...

Continue reading this post >>

April 26, 2012

In case you thought we had forgotten about Publix...

Massive march in Sarasota, pray-in in St. Pete keep the pressure on Florida's hold-out grocer...

While the 2012 Northeast Tour took the fight for Fair Food to Stop & Shop, Giant, and Chipotle, back home in Florida the Publix front in the Campaign for Fair Food has been anything but quiet.

With a huge pray-in at a St. Petersburg Publix store (right) and a massive march on a Publix in Sarasota (above) -- not to mention a continuing barrage of letters to Publix from disillusioned customers -- Fair Food activists in Florida have kept the heat on Florida's largest grocer.

So, check out the photo reports from the St. Pete pray-in and the Sarasota march, but first, take a moment to read the letters below from former Publix customers for a sense of the kind of feedback executives in Lakeland are getting every day from a growing number of disenchanted shoppers.

The first comes to us from David Moynahan of Crawfordville, Florida, who wrote to let us know that he is, "gradually handing the attached letter to management in all the Publix stores in Tallahassee, as well as giving copies to friends and encouraging them to write their own or participate in whatever ways they can." Here's what Publix managers across the Tallahassee area are reading these days:

Continue reading this post >>

April 24, 2012

New article profiles Fair Food Standards Council, Sarasota-based watchdog organization tasked with monitoring compliance with Fair Food Code of Conduct...

Former New York State Supreme Court Judge Laura Safer Espinoza (above), Executive Director of the new third-party monitor, tells Sarasota Herald Tribune, "it's an honor and a privilege to be part of a moment in history when buyers and growers and workers come together to rectify an historic injustice."

The CIW's Fair Food Program (FFP) -- a unique collaboration among farmworkers, growers, and retail food corporations that represents the culmination of nearly two decades of farmworker and consumer organizing to improve working conditions for Florida's tomato pickers -- went into effect on over 90% of Florida's tomato farms for the first time this season. To oversee the ground-breaking social responsibility program, the Fair Food Standards Council (FFSC) was born, its mission "to monitor the development of a sustainable Florida tomato industry that advances both the human rights of farmworkers and the long-term interests of growers through implementation of the Fair Food Program."

This past weekend, the FFSC and its Executive Director, Judge Laura Safer Espinoza, were profiled in a great new article by the Sarasota Herald Tribune. Here's an excerpt:

The FFSC is the embodiment of the Fair Food Program's commitment to monitoring and enforcement of the new human rights standards established under the Fair Food Code of Conduct. That commitment -- combining regular field and farm office audits with a rigorous complaint investigation and resolution process, and backed by the CIW's on-the-farm, on-the-clock education around the code's new labor standards for tens of thousands of tomato harvesters across the state -- sets the Fair Food Program apart in the world of social responsibility, where corporate codes of conduct have proliferated but are rarely monitored and even more rarely enforced.

The implementation of the Fair Food Progrm is still a work in progress -- the 2011-2012 season, which is coming to a close here in just a couple of weeks, marks its pilot season -- and there is [still] a long road ahead before the changes underway can be considered stable and complete. The Fair Food Program is a very new way of doing business in an indsutry that has resisted change for decades, and there is much to be done before all the bad actors and old habits are weeded out and new, more modern practices are firmly rooted. But the FFSC and the CIW's worker-to-worker education program give the Fair Food Program the best chance to succeed where so many other codes of conduct and social responsibilty programs have failed.

So, check out the Herald Tribune article today for a closer look at the exciting new organization (including comments from some of the growers and retail corporations supporting the Fair Food Program), and then come back again soon for a report from this past weekend's big Publix protest!

April 22, 2012

Rev. Michael Livingston, National Council of Churches: Ahold's Standards of Engagement a table that "has only two legs. It cannot stand."

Fourth and final update from the NE Tour takes us to Giant headquarters in Landover, MD for a spirited protest, reunion with Fast for Fair Food friends!

The NE Tour crew saved the best for last, as the final action of the Tour -- which took CIW members and allies to stops in Boston, Philadelphia, New York, and Washington DC to press supermarket giant Ahold and fast-food burrito king Chipotle to join the CIW's growing Fair Food Program -- combined a protest outside the Landover, MD, headquarters of the Giant supermarket chain (one of Ahold's two principal chains in the US) with a mini-reunion of fasters from last month's Fast for Fair Food, including the Rev. Michael Livingston (above, left), Director of the National Council of Church's Poverty Initiative...

Continue reading this post >>

April 17, 2012

NE Tour rolls into Philly, NYC, bringing the fight to Giant, Stop & Shop, and Chipotle!

See the big weekend updates here and here...

Two huge days of action means four exciting protests, two big photo reports, and a bunch of media links. So, grab a seat and settle in for a double shot of Campaign for Fair Food news!

And for just a taste of the weekend's action before you head over to the reports, have a look at the letter delivered by representatives of ten U Penn student organizations to the manager of the Chipotle restaurant on their campus (cue the theme song to this seminal battle in the Campaign for Fair Food... ok, well, there was no theme song, but you get the idea):

Continue reading this post >>

April 13, 2012

2012 Northeast Tour holds first major action outside Stop & Shop headquarters
in Quincy, Massachusetts!

Leonel Perez of the CIW (left) meets a representative of Ahold (Stop & Shop and Giant's Dutch parent company) outside Ahold's headquarters in Quincy, Massachusetts, during yesterday's action, which took place despite a particularly heavy April shower.

CIW, allies get Ahold's attention with spirited protest, theater, and face to face message...

The CIW's 2012 Northeast Tour kicked off yesterday with a rally under the rain outside Stop & Shop and Giant's corporate offices in Quincy, MA. CIW members were joined by a broad swath of allies, including community members and students, and faith and labor representatives from over a dozen groups across New England, including City Life/Vida Urbana, Centro Presente, Interfaith Worker Justice, Emerson College, Brown University, Northeastern University, SEIU, United Church of Christ, Dorshei Tzedek, Occupy Boston, Occupy Quincy, and the Arlington Street Church.

Continue reading this post >>

April 9, 2012

2012 Northeast Tour to launch this week... Stop & Shop, Giant, and Chipotle on the hotseat!

Tour to return to Northeast cities of epic
2011 Do the Right Thing Tour...

The Campaign for Fair Food is returning to familiar ground this week, as workers from Immokalee and their allies from student and faith communities head north up I-95 to the great cities of the Northeast -- with stops in Washington and Philadelphia, New York, and Boston -- to keep the heat on supermarket chains Stop & Shop and Giant and food movement darling Chipotle for their refusal to partner with farmworkers and support the CIW's Fair Food Program.

The 2012 Tour will be returning to the scene of some of the most exciting actions of last year's Do the Right Thing Tour, including the incredible march on Stop & Shop of nearly 1,000 Boston area Fair Food activists in freezing temperatures and snow (pictured above).

The action starts this Thursday, April 12, so be sure to check in as the launch of the Tour approaches, and to check out the details for the dates, times, places and contact people for all the key actions here! If you're in the Northeast and are reading this, you are not going to want to miss the 2012 Tour!

April 6, 2012

USDA Passover celebration puts a tomato on the Seder plate!...

USDA blog: "The second part of the seder connected the Israelites’ experience with slavery to modern struggles of farm workers and others in the food industry."

United States Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack hosted the USDA's second "Food and Justice Passover Seder" this past Wednesday -- at the Secretary's Executive Dining Room, no less -- with this year's event, "centered on the themes of hunger, access to healthy food, sustainable food production, and fair treatment for farm workers."

The Secretary (show here above, standing, immediately following his speech at Wednesday night's dinner) invited the CIW and Student/Farmworker Alliance to attend, and, in keeping with this week's call by the Rabbis for Human Rights -- North America, added a tomato to the Seder plate!

The USDA blog has a great write up from the event. Here's an excerpt:

There is no better way to celebrate these holiest of days than to connect the message of liberation at the heart of the Passover story to the ongoing fight for human rights in the fields today. The CIW congratulates Sec. Vilsack and the Administration for their vision and courage in making this powerful statement of support for fundamental human rights in our food system.

April 4, 2012

A tomato on the Seder plate this year, next year an end to slavery in the fields!

Rabbis for Human Rights calls for reflection on modern-day slavery in this year's Passover celebrations across the US...

With a full court press in Jewish community media from New York to LA, the ever-inspiring Rabbis for Human Rights-North America(RHR-NA) have put the issue of slavery in our food system front and center on holiday tables across the country this Passover.

Continue reading this post >>

April 2, 2012

Florida Council of Churches calls on congregants this Holy Week to "Fast for Fair Food"

Inspired by the participation of Florida faith leaders and congregants in last months' Fast for Fair Food, the Florida Council of Churches has issued a call for people of good will to choose a day during this Holy Week to fast and pray "that Publix will affirm its better self to 'do the right thing.'" They have even set up a page for people to send letters to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw explaining why they are fasting this week for Fair Food!

Continue reading this post >>

March 30, 2012

You've got mail!

Letters to the editor, letters to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw, piling up in wake of Fast...

The Fast for Fair Food touched many people -- across the state of Florida and around the country -- very, very deeply. And it didn't just move those observing the Fast from the outside. Its effect was so powerful that it knocked some longtime CIW veterans off their feet, too. In the words of CIW member Nely Rodriguez, "We set out to transform Publix, and in the process we transformed ourselves."

So it's hardly surprising that such an intense action led many a Fair Food activist to take pen in hand (or keyboard, as the case may be), and put his or her feelings about Publix and the grocery giant's refusal to meet with the CIW about the Fair Food Program into words. We've received quite a number of such letters, one of which we shared at the end of the recent post on continuing violence against farmworkers. Today we've chosen a few more recent letters to share with you, to give you a sense of what the mailbag at Publix must be looking like these days. Enjoy:

Continue reading this post >>

March 28, 2012

Food blogosphere starting to pick up scent of Chipotle's Fair Food fail...

Food blogs theperennialplate.com and treehugger.com latest to take Chipotle to task for refusal to work with
CIW to ensure highest standards in tomato supply chain

Since the public dust-up two weeks ago at a national food writers' conference -- where Chipotle Communications Director Chris Arnold was called out for the company's inexplicable refusal to sign a Fair Food agreement -- more and more food movement writers are demanding an explanation as to why Chipotle is turning its back on a partnership with farmworkers.

Continue reading this post >>

March 22, 2012

Lost in the Flood...

A truly insightful reflection and two great videos from the Fast for Fair Food...

The Fast for Fair Food generated such a flood of unforgettable coverage -- both by the traditional media and by the fasters and their allies themselves -- that some very good stuff got lost in the process of reporting it all on this site.

[Editor's Note: Of course, we are partial to these three extraordinary videos -- one, two, three -- from the CIW media team, which definitely merit a re-watching if you haven't seen them in a while!]

Today we wanted to highlight a few of those things lost in the flood of Fast coverage, including two more fun, and well-made, videos that convey some of the unique spirit and pageantry of Day Six of the Fast (one of which is above and the other at the end of this post)...

Continue reading this post >>

March 18, 2012

And in other news.... Food writers put spotlight back on "the fly in Chipotle's kitchen!"

Last Sunday, as participants in the Fast for Fair Food were making their way back home, an event was taking place in Santa Barbara, California, that would once again highlight the contradiction between the carefully crafted public image and on-the-ground practice of one longtime Fair Food hold-out: Chipotle Mexican Grill.

The event was the Edible Institute 2012, "a two-day gathering with some of the local food movements most influential thinkers, writers and producers," and it included speakers such as Barry Estabrook (author of "Tomatoland"), Tracy McMillan (author of "The American Way of Eating"), Helene Yorke (an executive at Fair Food partner Bon Appetit Management Company), and none other than Chipotle's very own Communications Director, Chris Arnold. The Twitter record helps establish the events of the day:

Continue reading this post >>

March 16, 2012

Support for Fast, Campaign, wide, deep...

Nearly 1,000 Fair Food activists flocked to Lakeland last Saturday to show their support for the 61 workers and allies who fasted for six-days to demand that Publix do its part to support the CIW's
Fair Food Program. Click here to see a remarkable photo slide show by Forest Woodward, a photographer who spent the entire week with the fasters as part of a documentary film crew.

A week later, support still coming in...

The impact of last week's Fast for Fair Food will not be fully known for some time to come, but the unprecedented dimensions of support for the fasters and their cause became clear even before the Fast began and only continued to grow after the Fast came to an end last Saturday.

The breadth of support -- from faith and student allies to small farmers, environmental activists, and more -- has been extraordinary. We've collected here below a few of the very latest messages of support that made their way into CIW headquarters.

Continue reading this post >>

March 14, 2012

In wake of Fast, Florida clergy take Publix to task...

Op/Eds in Florida papers challenge Publix to take a stand for farm labor rights!

Florida clergy are taking to the newspapers in the state's largest cities to denounce Publix's cold indifference to workers' and consumers' calls to support the CIW's Fair Food Program, or what one writer calls "the rot at the center of what would otherwise be a stellar company."

Just days after workers broke their six-day fast outside Publix headquarters in Lakeland, op/eds written by Florida clergy have appeared in the Jacksonville Florida Times Union and the Orlando Sentinel calling on Publix to stop fighting the Fair Food Program and to start talking to the CIW about how Florida's richest corporation can help improve the lives of Florida's poorest workers, whose historically undervalued labor has helped fuel Publix's growth for decades.

Continue reading this post >>

March 12, 2012

And, now, at last, the one you've
been waiting for...

The fifth and final video from
the Fast for Fair Food!

There is much more to come as we wrap up our reports from the Fast for Fair Food, including statements of support from the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) and the National Family Farm Coalition, more incredible photos, and all the news and opinion from around the country. Check back soon for all the latest updates.

March 10, 2012

"Truth crushed to earth shall rise again"...

On morning of Day Six, News-Press article belies Publix disinformation campaign against CIW's Fair Food Program

"‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.” (Mark 12:30-31).

*****

"You may well ask: ‘Why direct action?’ Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path? You are quite right in calling for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community that has consistently refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue so that it can no longer be ignored…

Nonviolent action brings to the surface the hidden tension that is already alive. We bring it out in the open, where it can be seen and dealt with. Like a boil that can never be cured so long as it is covered up but must be opened with all its ugliness to the natural medicines of air and light, injustice must be exposed, with all the tension its exposure creates, to the light of human conscience and the air of national opinion before it can be cured…" (Martin Luther King, Letter from a Birmingham Jail)

*****

As workers and their allies prepare to end their week-long fast outside Publix corporate headquarters in Lakeland, an article in today's edition of the Ft. Myers News-Press, "Publix protesters set to end six-day fast," takes a closer look at Publix's stated reasons for not joining the CIW's Fair Food Program. And what it finds effectively shreds the company's public relations talking points, leaving Publix with nowhere to hide from the swelling consumer demand that Florida's largest company stop stalling and start doing its part to end the state's Harvest of Shame. Here's an extended excerpt:

Continue reading this post >>

March 10, 2012

Fast for Fair Food: Day Five

Day Five of the Fast for Fair Food was another day full of news and surprises -- including the first rain of the week -- capped off by the arrival of allies and families of the fasters ahead of Saturday's huge procession and celebration to break the Fast.

Support for the fasters and their call for a partnership with Publix, based on mutual respect, to advance human rights in the fields has grown exponentially over the week. Clergy and lay people, students and families, people from all walks of life have heard the fasters' call and rallied to their side, laying the foundation for a powerful movement to break through Publix's resistance and bring Florida's largest corporation into the Fair Food Program.

Go to the Fast for Fair Food website to see "Postcards from the Fast" (photos and portraits from today's action without description), a full media round-up from Day Five, and more. Then check back tomorrow for updates from Day Six!

March 9, 2012

More video from the Fast site...

 
Ethel Kennedy, Robert Kennedy Jr., Latin Artist Jose Jose joining workers to break fast tomorrow!

As Day Five winds down, and workers and their allies prepare for tomorrow's big procession and ceremony to break the Fast, we have some wonderful, breaking news to share: Mrs. Ethel Kennedy, widow of the late Sen. Robert F. Kennedy, and her son, Robert F. Kennedy Jr., himself a staunch defender of the environment and activist for social justice, will be joining Kerry Kennedy in Lakeland to be with workers as they break their six-day fast!

Also, Latin artist Jose Jose -- with 35 albums, and over 40 million records sold, to his credit -- will also be joining workers for the fast-breaking ceremony. Click here if you are interested in attending tomorrow's big action, and check back soon for more from Day Five, including a Photo Report, media round-up, and more!

March 9, 2012

Fast for Fair Food: Day Four

A poll taken this week by Tampa Bay's Channel 10 News shows that the
Campaign for Fair Food wins over Publix's intransigence in a landslide!

Go to the Fast website to see the Photo Report and all the news and CIW media from Day Four!

The fasters celebrated International Women's Day at the Fast site today, received still more words of support from around the country, and welcomed more friends to the Fast ahead of Saturday's big procession and celebration of the breaking of the Fast.

Among the well wishers was Frances Moore Lappe, author of Diet for a Small Planet, who wrote:

"You all are my heroes! Thank you, thank you for your courage and determination and the dignity you embody. You WILL succeed because your cause is just and your spirit is powerful. I want to continue to be supportive of CIW in any way that I can. May basic decency prevail and your goals be achieved NOW!"

Arielle Rosenberg, the Rabbinical Student at Hebrew College in Boston who has been fasting in solidarity all week, sent this news:

"Just so you know, the Taanit Esther fast being dedicated to the Fast for Fair Food was a huge success! A bunch of students dedicated their fast today, as did rabbis in Boston, a synagogue in NY, and a Jewish community in Portland, Oregon. The CIW network is so impressive, and it's been an amazing experience to make that manifest by fasting together. It was nice to have solidarity with people today, I'll say that!"

And speaking of the Taanit Esther fast, 85 rabbis, cantors, and Jewish community members signed an open letter to Publix pledging their fast to be "in support of the members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers currently fasting outside of your Lakeland headquarters in the Fast for Fair Food." Here's the letter:

"We, the undersigned rabbis, cantors, and Jewish community members, urge Publix to work with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) and the Florida tomato industry to address the sub-poverty wages and human rights abuses faced by farmworkers who pick tomatoes sold at Publix. Today, the Jewish community observes Ta'anit Esther, the Fast of Esther. In the Torah, before Queen Esther approaches the King of Persia to ask for the safety of her people, she fasts and asks the Jewish people to fast in solidarity with her. We continue her fast today. We have pledged our fasts today to be in support of the members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers currently fasting outside of your Lakeland headquarters in the Fast for Fair Food. Jews across the country applaud this fast and urge you to begin negotiations with the CIW. By working with the CIW to enforce a code of conduct for basic rights for farmworkers, including zero tolerance for slavery, Publix can ensure that the tomatoes you sell are not the product of slave labor and exploitative working conditions. Will you be a leader in the grocery industry by agreeing to the CIW's Fair Food Campaign."

So, go to the Fast for Fair Food website to see the full Photo Report and media round-up from Day Four, and check back soon for more news from the Fast site!

March 8, 2012

This video says it all...

 

Last night's vigil outside the Grove Park Publix in Lakeland was an experience that captured virtually every aspect of the Fast for Fair Food to this point:

* the soul force of the fasters and their allies up against the brute economic force of a $27 billion company based in a small Central Florida city;

* the remarkable eloquence of those who are foregoing food for justice against the mute disdain of those Publix executives who sell food and have refused, since 2007, to afford workers calling for more humane working conditions at the base of the food industry the simple courtesy of a response;

* the genuine humanity of people coming together for change, a perfect example of Dr. King's "beloved community", encountering the cold resistance of a corporation that defines community as it sees fit and claims, in its corporate mission statement, to be "Involved as Responsible Citizens in our Communities."

But rather than go on, we'll just share with you the reflections of the Rev. Bernice Powell Jackson, First United Church of Tampa, President, World Council of Churches from North America, who was present at the vigil and was left standing in the parking lot with a small delegation of faith leaders, workers, and students, refused even a brief face-to-face meeting with the store manager:

As we get stronger…Publix gets weaker. That’s what was so evident tonight as we held a candlelight vigil outside the Publix in Lakeland. After singing, lighting candles, reading scripture, listening to testimonies by fasters and praying, a small delegation went to meet with the Publix store manager, as has happened at almost every Publix vigil or march throughout FL over the past few years. The managers always come out and talk. Some are more open than others to hearing the story about why we are there and why the workers want to sit down and talk with Publix leaders. But just having the conversation, usually led by farm workers and faith leaders, establishes our common humanity. Tonight, however, the Publix store manager refused to come out and talk. He refused to come and look us in the eye. He sent someone out to say he won’t talk to us and the sheriff to tell us this was private property. So since we couldn’t talk with him, we prayed for him and for all the workers inside the store. Just as we had done earlier, we prayed for Ed Crenshaw, for George Jenkins’ family members and all the Publix corporate leaders that God might soften their hearts. A couple of weeks ago I wrote to my congregation that I believed that the reason that Publix will not sit down with CIW leaders is that they would have to look the workers in the eye and they know that they have a morally indefensible position. After tonight, I know that in the very core of my being. And the fact that they would not allow the Lakeland store manager to even talk with us says to me that the moral power of the workers and the fasters is wearing down the corporate power of Publix. Dr. King once said, “The arc of the moral universe is long but it bends towards justice.” One of the signs which the workers are holding up outside the Publix headquarters says, “I go hungry today so my children won’t have to tomorrow.” That’s moral power. And that’s the power which overturned segregation and apartheid. Moral power ended those systems of oppression despite the economic, political and military power which supported them. Fasting is a way of connecting to that moral universe and its power. I believe tonight showed us it’s working…. Rev. Bernice Powell Jackson, pastor, First United Church of Tampa

March 7, 2012

Fast for Fair Food: Day Three

Go to the Fast website to see the Photo Report and all the news and CIW media from Day Three!

Day Three saw visits to the Fast site by clergy from Lakeland and around the state - including a United Methodist pastor from Lakeland who floored the fasters with his MC skills (don't miss the video below!) - as well as the arrival of still more new fasters and still more heartwarming expressions of solidarity.

So, be sure to visit the Fast for Fair Food website to see the Photo Report and all the media from Day Three. But before you go, we have two things we just have to share with you from today.

First, check out the video here below for a sense of the scene at the Fast site, a scene that is growing ever more vibrant, despite the increasing difficulty of the fast, every day:

And second, we received several deeply moving emails today from a group of 30 students at the River City Science Academy in Jacksonville, FL. They sent a statement they drafted together expressing their support for the Campaign for Fair Food, photos capturing their own sacrifices they are making solidarity with the fasters, and pictures of a mural they made to celebrate the Fast. They also promised to send a video tomorrow and to join the fasters at Saturday's march and celebration here in Lakeland. We were, quite simply, blown away.

Here below are two of the photos and their statement:

Statement for the CIW Teenagers and young people in general have never been known for their willingness to sacrifice, especially in America. We decided to disprove this stereotype by standing in solidarity with the Immokalee workers. To stand in solidarity we are giving up something that we normally indulge in and are abstaining from for the whole week, so we may experience just a little bit of what the Immokalee workers go through every day. For most of us, the idea of going without food, water, or electricity, is horrifying, but also an abstract concept that none of us have ever experienced. By refraining from something that we normally use every day, we can realize the hardships felt by the Immokalee workers, and better realize the injustices being committed, and how critical it is that the suffering and abuses come to an end. Our club of over 30 students has worked on numerous projects to commemorate the fasting farm workers, and have been studying their plight since the beginning of the year. To demonstrate their solidarity, our entire club is giving up something in their lives for the week, three of whom are fasting food from sun-up to sundown and three of whom are fasting all food for the six days. The more artistic members of our group have painted a mural about the Immokalee workers, in order to serve as a reminder of what is happening and how we demand change. We have presented workshops for around 500 students covering every grade at our school about the atrocities happening in Immokalee. We have gotten over 500 people to write and send letters to Publix managers and completed and sent over 30 post cards to local Publix stores. We will be bringing around 30 people to march on Saturday, to show Publix that we care about the farm workers. We believe in fair wages. We believe in doing the right thing. We believe in the words of Publix founder George W. Jenkins that, “Making a profit should never get in the way of doing the right thing.” We believe that the abuses must come to an end. We believe that injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

The future is in very good hands...

See the rest of the Day Three Report at the Fast for Fair Food website and check back tomorrow for more!

March 6, 2012

Fast for Fair Food: Day Two

Go to the Fast website to see the Photo Report and all the news and CIW media from Day Two!

Day Two of the Fast for Fair Food has come and gone, and in the course of the day the fasters received a powerful letter of support from Congressman Luis Gutierrez, watched a warm video greeting from solidarity fasters with Mountain Justice in West Virginia, received dozens of visitors at the Fast site, and welcomed five new fasters, students at Polk State College right here in Lakeland, all while holding things down -- sometimes quite literally, with wind gusts up to 30 miles an hour all day long! -- at the site outside Publix headquarters.

But before we get to the news of the day, we have to share the great new video from Day One with you. Have a look:

Day One was truly memorable, and Day Two only added to the momentum. The fasters started the day with an unexpected message of support from Washington, DC, specifically from US Congressman Luis Gutierrez, representative from Illinois:

Then, throughout the day, as the fasters held their vigil outside Publix, more messages of support poured in, as did more visitors and even a team of new fasters! Here below is a great, heartfelt video from people with Mountain Justice, fighting mountaintop removal in West Virginia and fasting in solidarity with the CIW at the same time:

 

And pictured here are five students from Polk State College in Lakeland who learned about the Fast and decided to join for the remainder the week (they join their fellow student Pablo, third from left, who joined the fast himself yesterday!):

Go to the Fast for Fair Food website for much more on Day Two, including the full Photo Report and press coverage.

March 5, 2012

"Why We Are Fasting"...

150 people gathered this morning at Publix headquarters in Lakeland, Florida -- including 61 workers from Immokalee and their allies who started their fast last night at midnight -- for the launch of the Fast for Fair Food. After a moving opening ceremony and a couple of hours spent setting up camp, the fasters settled into what will be their daily routine for the coming week -- morning medical check-ups, music, presentations, and standing in witness to the daily struggle for survival of their fellow farmworkers in the fields of Florida.

At the final meeting last night before today's launch of the fast, a CIW member read a statement entitled "Why We Are Fasting". We are including it here below in its entirety.

[You can follow the fast during the day on facebook and twitter (using the hashtag #fairfoodfast) and check back here this afternoon for a full report from Day One of the Fast for Fair Food!]:

Why We Are Fasting Farmworkers have, for generations, been denied a fair wage for the arduous work we do in the fields. In return for the vital contributions we make to this country's economy and society we have received decades of stagnant wages and abuses of our basic rights. The just wages we merit have instead been taken from us by corporations like Publix and others at the top of the food system who have used their unprecedented power to demand artificially cheap tomatoes from their suppliers. These purchasing practices rob workers of much of their fairly earned compensation and contribute mightily to the profit margins of these giant food retailers, representing a massive transfer of money up the supply chain. This is why, for generations, hundreds of thousands of farmworkers and their families have been impoverished while over the course of generations Publix has become unimaginably wealthy. While, for decades, there was no alternative to this structural farm labor exploitation, Publix could wash its hands of any direct accountability for the brutal working and living conditions faced by Florida's farmworkers. But that has changed. With the CIW's historic agreement with the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange in 2010, and the subsequent implementation of the Fair Food Program on over 90% of Florida's tomato farms, the opportunity exists today to right a wrong that has plagued the food industry for generations, to finally end Florida's Harvest of Shame. Yet, despite this opportunity to do the right thing – to support a proven model for social responsibility that is already backed by ten other retail food giants – Publix has refused to do its part, turning its back on farmworkers and on its customers who, in massive numbers, have demonstrated their support for farm labor justice. Publix is deliberately choosing to keep doing business as if it were the last century, continuing to enrich itself at the expense of the state's most exploited workers. In other words, by turning its back on the Fair Food Program, Publix has moved from passively profiting from farmworker poverty to affirmatively perpetuating it. This is an amoral and fundamentally indefensible choice. For these reasons we declare: Our struggle is for respect and a fair wage but Publix treats our dignity like a commodity. Our struggle is for all actors the Fair Food Program so that abuses can no longer be committed with impunity or tolerated without consequence. And Publix responds, “If there are some atrocities going on, it's not our business.” This, while it profits from the humiliation and abuses that make possible the cheap tomatoes that it purchases. Our struggle is for justice and so that our community does not have to go hungry despite being some of the hardest working people in our nation. But Publix hides behind its mask of excuses and cold public relations to evade responsibility. Our struggle is a moral struggle that will not be resolved under the dark clouds of greed and dishonesty, but rather under the purifying light of a commitment to work together. We call on Publix to live up to the words of its own founder, George Jenkins, who declared “never let profit get in the way of doing the right thing.” Publix, the agricultural industry needs you to support the changes taking root today under the Fair Food Program. Your own customers demand this and hope for you to do the right thing. Farmworker families also demand this – families who are also your neighbors and who hope for the day that you recognize their humanity. And so, today we fast so that Publix will stop lying to confuse the public. Today we fast so that Publix gains the integrity and the moral courage to look in farmworkers' eyes and speak directly and respectfully with us so that we may find a way to work together. Today we fast so that tomorrow none of our children are forced to surrender their dignity or to suffer through hunger just to work. Today we fast so that the people in charge of Publix can understand in their hearts that there is no reason to fight against these profoundly human changes that are already taking root. Today we fast so that Publix and the Jenkins family understand that the changes we seek are necessary, possible, and inevitable. Today we fast so that we may bring an end to a conflict we never wanted – and sit at the table together with Publix to construct a reality in which no one's prosperity is based on the blood, sweat, tears and humiliation of another human being. For a future where food is produced with dignity, we fast.

March 3, 2012

Solidarity actions, words of support, media continue to flood in on eve of the Fast for Fair Food!

Tampa Bay Times op/ed: Publix "disingenuous"...

Solidarity faster in Boston (right): "It is a stony strength that allows people to gather, in Florida and across the country, and insist that Publix take notice and commit to honoring the work of those who make their business possible."

On the eve of the Fast for Fair Food, an op/ed by Bill Maxwell -- one of Florida's most respected journalists and a former farmworker himself -- flatly debunks Publix's stale and, in his words, "disingenuous", public relations responses to the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food. Here's an excerpt:

"Still fighting for a penny per pound" Sunday, March 4, 2012 "... CIW leaders said the extra penny is making a positive impact. Still, Publix continues to hold out. I asked Shannon Patten, the company's media and community relations manager, why. In an email, she wrote that Publix pays market value for tomatoes and would pay an extra penny if growers and packers would put it in the price, but the company will not pay employees of other companies directly for their labor... ... As much as I appreciate Publix's response to my questions, I believe the company is disingenuous when it accuses the CIW of asking it to pay the employees of other employers directly. Gerardo Reyes, the CIW's spokesman, said more than $4 million has been distributed to workers since Jan. 11 through the Fair Food program, and none of the money has been paid in any transaction between retail purchasers and the workers. He said Publix officials know that. "Not only does the Fair Food program not require what Publix is claiming, it does not allow it," Reyes said. "The fair food premium works like a fair trade premium does. And Publix pays and promotes that on every bag of its Greenwise Fair Trade Coffee. Tomato retail buyers pay a small premium to the grower on every pound of tomatoes they buy through the Fair Food program. The growers then distribute that money to their workers through their regular payroll as a line item on each worker's paycheck. "Publix says they would pay the fair food premium if the growers would only 'put it in the price.' Well, they should consider their bluff called. The growers will put the premium in the price for any retailer who wants that, and we would sign a fair food agreement today with Publix stating they can pay that way if that is what they want." read more

We can only hope that, as the coverage of the Fast continues, other members of the media show the same willingness to question Publix's patently false statements on the Fair Food Program and hold Florida's largest corporation (with $27 billion in sales last year and $1.5 billion in profits) to the truth when it explains why it can't pay a penny more per pound for Florida tomatoes and do its part to end decades of farmworker poverty and degradation.

Meanwhile, as workers in Immokalee and allies around the country make their final preparations for Day One of the Fast, the volume of messages of encouragement and pledges to fast in solidarity continues to grow so large it has become truly humbling.

And so, once again, we bring you a sample of the support -- so eloquently expressed -- from across the country:

From Arielle Rosenberg (pictured at the top of this post), a Rabbinical Student at Hebrew College who visited Immokalee on a Rabbis for Human Rights (RHR) delegation this fall, has committed to a six-day solidarity fast in Boston. She's also working with RHR to encourage people across the country to dedicate their Purim fast on Wednesday to the farmworker struggle. Here are her words:

"And I returned and considered all the oppressions that were done under the sun and beheld the tears of those that were oppressed and they had no comforter, but on the side of their oppressor there was power, but they had no comforter." (Ecclesiastes 4:1) The Coalition of Immokalee Workers has issued an invitation to consumers again and again over the last twenty years to recognize that what enables the comfortable stupor of consumption are abusive working conditions, low wages, and environmental havoc. It has invited us to remember that we are not just individuals, mired in comfort, but instead form a grand network of people who share a common reality, common struggles. Not only does the CIW invite us to recognize this, but it asks us to take action. The Fast for Fair Food is a chance for workers and allies to come together, to refuse the comfort of food for six days, and to grow strong together. There is a power in strength, in clarity of vision, in living into a reality that holds that those who harvest the food for this nation should not go hungry, that those whose labors form the foundation of this society should be recognized and work with dignity. It is a stony strength that allows people to gather, in Florida and across the country, and insist that Publix take notice and commit to honoring the work of those who make their business possible. I will be fasting this week in Boston, and I stand with the CIW and all those who will be gathering in Lakeland. There is nothing comfortable about denying the body food, there is nothing comfortable about missing work for a week, or spending a week telling Publix what they should have recognized long ago. The Fast for Fair Food cannot be comfortable, but it will be transformative. That transformation will bring about a change at Publix, that's for certain. It will also bring about a change in how we see each other, and what we know to be possible."

From Boston we travel clear across the country where Lucy Butte, California Director of National Farm Workers Ministry, sends these words on the eve of the fast:

"I am in prayer for you as you begin this very beautiful experience seeking solidarity in true communion with each other and God's grace. The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, in their "First Fridays for Food Security: August 5, 2011," issue a call on the faithful to: "Be mindful of the struggle of farm workers for dignity, and when possible, consider purchasing goods from markets and companies that ensure just treatment of farm workers and pay a wage that is sufficient to support a family. As more consumers become concerned with the treatment of farm workers, fair trade movements and products are becoming more prevalent in the marketplace." The church stands with you as you fast for justice. My prayers are that each of the fasters may know that there are many who are joining them in prayer, some fasting and all in solidarity asking our God to break through Publix leadership's hearts and minds that they may do what is just, moral and responsible. And that is to come to the table with farm workers and Immokalee to address farm worker issues."

And finally, we return right back home to Florida, for these words from Professor Eric Castillo,
Assistant Director and Multicultural & Diversity Affairs Director of the Institute for Hispanic-Latino Cultures -- aka "La Casita" -- at the University of Florida:

"On behalf of the Institute of Hispanic-Latino Cultures "La Casita," I want to express to you all our wholehearted support for your brave and valiant efforts. We are moved by your willingness to sacrifice so much of yourselves for such a worthy cause. While your bodies may grow weary from hunger, we are praying for your good health and success in bringing Publix to the table. We stand in solidarity with you and want you to know that your sacrifice reminds us of our responsibility to advocate for equity, parity, inclusion, and social justice for everyone."

He adds this PS, about two of the UF students joining the fasters in Lakeland: "Please take care of my students Juliette and Victor! They are remarkable young folks and we miss them!"

Tomorrow the Fast for Fair Food begins. Check back soon for a report from the workers' departure from Immokalee and news from Day One in Lakeland!

March 2, 2012

Flood waters rising... Statements of support, solidarity actions, media coverage come rushing in ahead of Monday's Fast for Fair Food!

Eric Schlosser: "It's a disgrace that a Florida company refuses to take responsibility for abuses occurring within miles of its stores."

(Long update alert!)...

With the Fast for Fair Food just a weekend away, awareness of the coming fast and of Publix's refusal to work with the CIW for human rights and justice in the fields is spreading like wildfire.

Statements of Support

Several new statements of support for the fasters made their way to Immokalee in the past two days, including the following note from best-selling author and producer ("Fast Food Nation", "Food, Inc."), Eric Schlosser:

"Publix claims, in its corporate mission statement, to be 'Involved as Responsible Citizens in our Communities.' Now it has an opportunity to give real meaning to those words--by helping to end the exploitation of farm workers whose backbreaking labor fills the shelves at Publix supermarkets with good food. It's a disgrace that a Florida company refuses to take responsibility for abuses occurring within miles of its stores. If McDonald's and Burger King and Taco Bell can commit to ending slavery and wage theft and sexual harassment in the tomato fields of Florida, then one of the state's largest supermarket chains can easily do the same. I'm sorry that I can't be in Lakeland to support the Fast for Fair Food. But I applaud the great courage and dedication to social justice that drives the Coalition of Immokalee Workers."

He was far from alone. Dr. Patrick Mason, Professor of Economics at Florida State University and Director of the African American Studies Program there, sent these words of encouragement along and pledged to join the fasters on March 10th:

Continue reading this post >>

February 29, 2012

Press Release:
Kerry Kennedy (right), daughter of the late Robert F. Kennedy, to take part in March 10th ceremony breaking the Fast for Fair Food!

Ms. Kennedy: "On March 10th... we rededicate ourselves to bringing dignity to US agriculture and real, lasting respect for human rights to our food system."

Martin Sheen: "... tomato pickers will, once again, teach Publix and actually all of us a vital lesson in courage, of how to transform inequality and upend injustice through the sacred power of non-violence."

The official Press Release for the Fast for Fair Food is online now. Here is an excerpt:

Background: For generations, farmworkers in Florida have been among the country’s worst paid, least protected workers. That exploitation has been driven, in large part, by companies like Publix. Retail food giants have wielded their unprecedented market power to demand artificially cheap tomatoes from their suppliers. At the farm level, this downward pressure on prices has resulted in a thirty-year, downward spiral of farmworker wages and working conditions. “While, for decades, there was no alternative to this structural farm labor exploitation, Publix could wash its hands of any direct accountability for the brutal working and living conditions faced by Florida's farmworkers,” said Gerardo Reyes of the CIW. “But that has changed. With the CIW's historic agreement with the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange in 2010, and the subsequent implementation of the Fair Food Program on over 90% of Florida's tomato farms, the opportunity exists today to right a wrong that has plagued the food industry for generations, to end Florida's Harvest of Shame.” “Yet, despite this opportunity to do the right thing -- to support a proven model for social responsibility that is already backed by ten other retail food giants just like Publix -- Publix has refused to do its part, turning its back on farmworkers and on its customers who, in massive numbers, have demonstrated their support for farm labor justice,” continued Reyes. “Instead, Publix is deliberately choosing to continue to do business as if it were the last century, continuing to enrich itself at the expense of the state's most exploited workers. In other words, by turning its back on the Fair Food Program, Publix has moved from passively profiting from farmworker poverty to affirmatively perpetuating it. This is an amoral and fundamentally indefensible choice. As workers we cannot allow that choice to stand. And that is why we will be going without food." read the Press Release in its entirety

Continue reading this post >>

February 28, 2012

Food movement leaders, Washington DC clergy latest to offer powerful words of encouragement to farmworkers, allies preparing to fast!

Raj Patel: "... And that is the great strength of this fast: it works... by reminding the people who work [at Publix] that they too are human, are capable of compassion, and of making change that is life-affirming."

Rabbi Charles Feinberg: "the farmworkers need to... push for what is due to them, but at the same time, they should know that they have many friends and supporters throughout the country"

Words of support continue to pour into CIW headquarters from across the country for the Fast for Fair Food, set to begin next week, Monday, March 5th.

This week, statements have come in from two distinct, yet deeply supportive, camps: the food justice movement and clergy, in this case clergy from the Nation's Capital.

On the food justice side, Raj Patel -- the British-born American academic, journalist, and author of the two widely read books, "Stuffed and Starved" and "The Value of Nothing" -- sent this moving message in support of the fasters:

"I confess that I couldn’t quite believe the Publix response to news that the tomatoes in their stores may involve modern-day slavery: 'If there are some atrocities going on, it's not our business.' How do you confront an organization as morally numb as this? With compassion. The fast can’t succeed unless Publix recognizes the humanity of the workers in Immokalee. And that is the great strength of this fast: it works not by embarrassing a shameless Fortune 500 company, but by reminding the people who work there that they too are human, are capable of compassion, and of making change that is life-affirming."

Continue reading this post >>

February 26, 2012

"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny."
- Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr., Letter from a Birmingham Jail

This past Wednesday, CIW members used twine to create a visible network reflecting Martin Luther King's notion of "interconnectedness" that bounds up the fate of each person with the whole of the community.

As Fast for Fair Food approaches, workers in Immokalee preparing to fast draw inspiration from human rights movement across the globe, the history of creative non-violence in forging social change, each other...

With the Fast for Fair Food just one week away, workers in Immokalee planning to join the fast have launched a series of meetings with a focus on the discipline and use of fasting as a tool for social change... and are taking a moment to party, too!

The past ten days in Immokalee have been a whirlwind of activity, and at the eye of that storm has been a quiet and deliberate process of reflection. Drawing on lessons from the giants of social justice throughout modern history -- from Mahatma Gandhi to Alice Paul and Martin Luther King -- CIW members have taken time over the past ten days to deepen their understanding of the mechanisms of social change and to share their own experiences of struggle. The Lenten season has added a profound seriousness to the discussions, and provided an example of the spiritual power of fasting for bringing about social justice familiar to all.

The reflections have been some of the most moving discussions in the long history of the CIW, touching on themes well beyond the specific question of the fast as "a sword that heals" to include explorations of the strength we derive from unity (above, right, workers step out from last week's meeting to demonstrate that, together, it is easy to do what it is impossible to do alone -- in this case, lift and move a truck across the parking lot through the air!), the universal nature of human rights, and the role of individuals and communities in making the world a fairer, better place...

Continue reading this post >>

February 24, 2012

"... theirs is a morally indefensible position and they can’t look the workers in the eye." Rev. Bernice Powell Jackson, First United Church of Tampa, President, World Council of Churches from North America

Father Les Singleton, speaking at Wednesday's press conference in Gainesville, holds pennies from his change after buying a tomato from a local Publix store. He later tossed the change on the ground to dramatize the unconscionable nature of Publix's refusal to pay the penny-per-pound premium and support the CIW's Fair Food Program.

Faith allies making their voices heard -- loud and clear -- in lead-up to Fast for Fair Food!

With strong words -- and deeds -- of support, the CIW's faith allies have stepped forward in a truly inspiring show of solidarity as the countdown to the Fast for Fair Food enters the final 10 days.

On the heels of the announcement that the Rev. Michael Livingston, former President of the National Council of Churches and current Director of the NCC's Poverty Initiative, would be joining the fasters, and this week's inter-faith press conference declaring support for the fast from the Gainesville area faith and student communities, three more Florida clergy have added their voices to the growing chorus calling on Publix to work with the CIW to defend human rights in the tomato fields of Florida...

Continue reading this post >>

February 23, 2012

Gainesville press conference: 3 UF students to join Fast for Fair Food!

Event brings together Gainesville faith, student, and civic leaders in united front for Fair Food...

With the Fast for Fair Food set to begin in just 11 days, people across the state and across the country are answering the call to action and declaring "I'll be there!" with the CIW at Publix headquarters in Lakeland, Florida.

Yesterday, at a moving press conference just across the street from the University of Florida campus in Gainesville, three UF students declared that they will be joining workers from Immokalee and other Fair Food allies in fasting all six days of the upcoming action. Further, dozens of UF students pledged to form a caravan to Lakeland for the Saturday, March 10th, picket and procession to Publix headquarters for the ceremony to break the week-long fast...

Continue reading this post >>

February 22, 2012

Rev. Michael Livingston, former President of the National Council of Churches, to join Fast for Fair Food!

Rev. Livingston, now Director of the NCC's Poverty Initiative, will be fasting all six days together with CIW members and other allies outside Publix headquarters in Lakeland...

Also: Fast for Fair Food Website now live!

Ash Wednesday is the beginning of the Christian season of Lent.

Rev. Noelle Damico of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.) describes the significance of Lent:

"Lent is a time when Christians examine their lives and repent of the ways they have failed to love God and neighbor. In the gospels we read that Jesus was driven into the wilderness for 40 days by the Holy Spirit. There he fasted, turning aside from temptations to use his power for kingdoms or splendor, and pledging himself to God and God’s desire alone. What is that desire? The prophet Isaiah announces God’s desire in the biblical reading for Ash Wednesday, “is this not the fast that I choose, to loose the bonds of injustice…” (Isaiah 58:1-12).

On this Ash Wednesday, we are honored to announce that the Rev. Michael Livingston, former president of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the U.S.A., now director of the NCC’s Poverty Initiative, will be fasting together with the CIW outside Publix headquarters from March 5-10th...

Continue reading this post >>

February 20, 2012

Girl Scouts of Gulf Coast Florida tour CIW Slavery Museum at conference against human trafficking...

... and step up to the plate in the battle
to end forced labor!

This past Saturday, the Girl Scout Council representing 10 counties across Southwest and Central Florida held a gathering in Sarasota for "an afternoon of community education and empowerment as we raise awareness of the growing epidemic of domestic human trafficking." The CIW was invited to bring the mobile Modern-Day Slavery Museum to the "Girls Protecting Girls Against Human Trafficking" event, and from all accounts the exchange between farmworkers from Immokalee and the young leaders gathered there was a huge success.

Continue reading this post >>

February 17, 2012

Publix Fast: More words of inspiration for the fasters, more press ahead of the fast...

Earlier this week we shared the words of allies -- Professor Carol Anderson of Emory University in Atlanta and Barry Estabrook, the widely respected food writer -- written in support of the upcoming Fast for Fair Food. Today, we have more words of inspiration for the fasters, this time from Marley Moynahan, a student ally at Georgetown University in Washington, DC, and the Rev. Noelle Damico of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.).

Marley Moynahan (DC Fair Food):

Why Fast? A Reflection on the Fast for Fair Food "... Fasting as a form of non-violent action – the refusal to be compliant and silent in the face of profound injustice - is the tool of those who believe that every human being amounts to something more valuable than brick and mortar. Those who believe that the path of gross inequality and economic injustice is wholly and unequivocally unacceptable – primarily because it is deeply and morally wrong, and additionally because it is unsustainable in any realistic longer vision of our future. The Campaign for Fair Food is an amplified collection of voices of farmworkers, young people, people of faith, and many other community members who are breathing life into the possibility of an alternative future. Already, in two decades, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and their allies have made enormous gains: increased pay for farmworkers in Florida, basic rights in the field such as shade, water, and freedom from violence, and a growing partnership of actors spread across the food chain who are shaping an entirely new, concrete system that fosters dialogue, respect, and accountability. Only last week, Trader Joe’s joined the Fair Food family, demonstrating, alongside Whole Foods, that supermarkets can join the fast food and food service industries in transforming U.S. agriculture from the soil to the kitchen. Even in the same moment that we congratulate Trader Joe’s and the nine other companies who have signed Fair Food Agreements with the CIW, there are still companies like Publix who are refusing to come to the table – who claim that their hands are clean and they have no role to play... ... That is why, as a young person profoundly invested in the future, as a Publix shopper, as a member of the human family, I am fasting for six days with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers in March. I will not concede to a future which requires routine violence in the name of Publix’s profit – or a future which marks someone else’s suffering as my “gain” in the form of an artificially cheap tomato. The sustainable path that I want to construct, that I am depending on requires dignity and respect for the whole human family – period." read more

Rev. Noelle Damico (Presbyterian Church U.S.A., shown in the photo below breaking the bread that workers and allies ate to end the fast at Taco Bell, 2003):

Continue reading this post >>

February 15, 2012

“When people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.” Martin Luther King, Jr., Memphis, April 3, 1968

With 20 days to go before the March 5th launch of the Fast for Fair Food, allies planning to join fasters are penning words of support, blog posts, and more...

In an unprecedented show of support ahead of a major Fair Food action, CIW allies from across the country are sending in expressions of solidarity for next month's Fast for Fair Food.

We will be posting a sample of those words of support from time to time as we approach March 5th and the launch of the six-day fast. Here below is our first installment, a wonderful note from Carol Anderson, a longtime ally and professor of African American Studies at Emory University in Atlanta, GA, and a short article by Barry Estabrook, food writer and author of the widely-acclaimed book on the Florida tomato industry, Tomatoland. Both will be visiting the fasters over the course of their week-long stay outside Publix headquarters in Lakeland.

From Professor Anderson:

"The decision to fast, to deny one’s body essential nourishment, to turn away from the very sustenance that gives life, can only happen when faced with a soul-crushing oppression that has rendered that very life precarious in the first place. Freedom fighters from Mahatma Gandhi to Anatoly Marchenko fasted to expose brutal systems of oppression. They fasted to make clear that there were no chains, no jails, no retribution strong enough to shackle the quest for dignity and human rights. The Campaign for Fair Food is in the same spirit. Martin Luther King, Jr. summarized it best. In his journey to shine a klieg light on the horrific labor conditions endured by the sanitation workers in Memphis, King observed, in the last speech of his life, that “When people get caught up with that which is right and they are willing to sacrifice for it, there is no stopping point short of victory.” That is the core essence of the Campaign for Fair Food and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers."

Continue reading this post >>

February 13, 2012

200 turn out to turn up the heat on Publix!
Momentum building ahead of next month's
Fast for Fair Food...

Yesterday's impromptu protest at a Naples area Publix turned out to be part massive picket, part joyous celebration. Over 200 Southwest Florida Fair Food activists -- a remarkably diverse and festive crowd -- switched tracks in the wake of last week's announcement of the CIW's agreement with Trader Joe's and moved their protest down Hwy 41 to a nearby Publix "Greenwise" store.

And after a vibrant, 2-hr action, the crowd gathered round to celebrate the Trader Joe's agreement with a custom-made Publix cake, inscription and all (on right, the cake, still in its box, reads: "Thank you Trader Joe's for signing the Fair Food Agreement")! It was the best money ever spent at Publix...

Click here for pictures from yesterday's high-spirited action, or here for the local CBS affiliate's report on yesterday's protest.

And check back soon for much more on the upcoming Fast for Fair Food!

February 10, 2012

Pivoting to Publix...

Workers from Immokalee arrive in Friday's early morning light at the parking lot of a North Naples Publix located at the intersection of Immokalee Road and Hwy 41 -- directly across the street from Trader Joe's first-ever Florida store -- following a 35-mile bike trip from Immokalee. The action was shifted to Publix after Trader Joe's and the CIW signed a Fair Food Agreement late yesterday. With Trader Joe’s decision, the only store on this corner selling tomatoes that were bought the old way, no questions asked, will be Publix. Workers and Fair Food allies will gather outside of Publix again this Sunday (corner of Vanderbilt and 41, @ 2pm) to call on Florida's grocery giant to follow the lead of Whole Foods and Trader Joe's in backing the CIW's groundbreaking Fair Food Program. You can listen to a great story on the bike protest by clicking here.

Following agreement with Trader Joe's, pressure mounts on Publix as Fast for Fair Food approaches...

As reaction continues to pour in from across the country to yesterday's news of the CIW's agreement with Trader Joe's, the Campaign for Fair Food turns to Publix, demanding -- with renewed urgency -- that Florida's largest grocer do its part to improve wages and working conditions in the fields where its tomatoes are picked.

We'll get back to Publix in a moment, but first just a word on the overwhelming response to the Trader Joe's agreement. And that word would be... Wow!

Twitter, Facebook, blogs and mainstream media all lit up like never before in the history of the Campaign for Fair Food, with well-wishers offering heartfelt congratulations -- to both the CIW and Trader Joe's -- and Fair Food activists letting Publix and the rest of the supermarket industry know that the time for standing in the way of progress is over...

Continue reading this post >>

February 9, 2012

Welcome aboard...

Trader Joe's and CIW sign
Fair Food agreement!

Here's the Press Release on this breaking news (also, please be sure to scroll down to see the important notice about the cancellation of this weekend's planned protests following the release):

For Immediate Release February 9, 2012 Contact: Gerardo Reyes, CIW (239) 657-8311 gerardo@ciw-online.org Alison Mochizuki, Director Public Relations, Trader Joe's (626) 599-3779 amochizuki@traderjoes.com Trader Joe’s and The Coalition of Immokalee Workers Sign Fair Food Agreement Monrovia, CA/Immokalee, FL -- Trader Joe’s and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) announced today that they have signed an agreement that formalizes the ways in which Trader Joe’s will work with the CIW and Florida tomato growers to support the CIW’s Fair Food Program. The Fair Food Program is a groundbreaking approach to social responsibility in the US produce industry that combines the Fair Food Code of Conduct – a set of labor standards developed in a unique collaboration among farmworkers, tomato growers, and the food industry leaders who purchase Florida tomatoes – with a small price premium to help improve harvesters’ wages. The goal of the Fair Food Program is to promote the development of a sustainable Florida tomato industry that advances both the human rights of farmworkers and the long-term interests of Florida tomato growers. “We are truly happy today to welcome Trader Joe’s aboard the Fair Food Program,” said Gerardo Reyes of the CIW. “Trader Joe’s is cherished by its customers for a number of reasons, but high on that list is the company’s commitment to ethical purchasing practices. With this agreement, Trader Joe’s reaffirms that commitment and sends a strong -- and timely -- message of support to the Florida growers who are choosing to do the right thing, investing in improved labor standards, despite the challenges of a difficult marketplace and tough economic times.” About Trader Joe’s: With the opening of the Naples, Florida location, Trader Joe’s operates 367 neighborhood grocery stores across the nation. More information at www.traderjoes.com. About the CIW: The CIW (www.ciw-online.org) is a community-based farmworker organization headquartered in Immokalee, Florida, with over 4,000 members. The CIW seeks modern working conditions for farmworkers and promotes their fair treatment in accordance with national and international labor standards. Among its accomplishments, the CIW has aided in the prosecution by the Department of Justice of six slavery operations and the liberation of well over 1,000 workers. The CIW’s Campaign for Fair Food has won unprecedented support for fundamental farm labor reforms from retail food industry leaders, with the goal of enlisting the market power of those companies to demand more humane labor standards from their Florida tomato suppliers.

Important Notice: The CIW thanks the tens of thousands of Fair Food activists around the country who helped make this tremendous step forward possible, especially those who had planned actions in over 40 cities this coming weekend. Naturally, in light of today's great news, the CIW is calling off the actions planned for the new Trader Joe's store in Naples. Similarly, we ask that all other actions planned for this weekend be cancelled, and that organizers and consumers who were planning to attend instead take a moment to congratulate Trader Joe's for having joined the Fair Food Program.

Onward to Publix, and the rest of the supermarket industry...

February 3, 2012

PBS newsweekly "Religion and Ethics" to cover Fair Food movement, prayer campaign this weekend!

This weekend, the PBS weekly news program "Religion and Ethics" will be airing an in-depth look at the CIW's Campaign for Fair Food and the role of faith in the growing movement for fundamental human rights in the fields. Check your local listings for broadcast times in your area. You can also see the 9-minute piece in the embeded video above, or watch it at the PBS website, where they have collected a number of useful links for background to the story. It is a very strong piece...

Continue reading this post >>

February 1, 2012

On faith, mountains, and moving Publix...



Q & A with Rev. Kennedy McGowan, Interfaith Action on exciting new prayer campaign to bring Publix
into the Fair Food fold...

Two weeks ago, we announced that Interfaith Action, the network of people of faith and religious institutions that partners with the CIW in the Campaign for Fair Food, had launched a pivotal new initiative designed to rally the power of prayer to move Publix from "isolation and hesitation... into communication and cooperation with the CIW."

Today we have more on the Faith Moves Mountains campaign, in the form of an interview with the Reverend Kennedy McGowan of the First Presbyterian Church of Hollywood, Florida, and Elena Stein of Interfaith Action. Together they explain everything from why a prayer campaign now to why they chose Martin Luther King Day to announce the new initiative...

Continue reading this post >>

January 30, 2012

TJ's Florida debut on Immokalee Road sparks dozens of national actions in solidarity with Fair Food protests Feb 10-12!

33 cities and counting ready to call on Trader Joe's to be the company it says it is...

Earlier this month, plans were announced for two days of protest in Naples, where Trader Joe's is readying for the grand opening of its first-ever Florida store. And where, exactly, might this flagship Florida store be located? Why, right on the corner of Immokalee Road and 41, just 35 miles from the farmworker community that has courageously led a decade-long battle for respect, dignity, and fair wages in the fields.

Well, a message like that is hard to miss, and it seems that Fair Food supporters in dozens of cities around the country are rallying to show their solidarity with workers in Immokalee and to send Trader Joe's a message of their own: It's time to sign a Fair Food agreement and advance farm labor justice in your supply chain!

Here below is the list of cities where solidarity actions will be taking place between Feb. 10-12, complete with contacts so that you can join in at a Trader Joe's near you:

Northeast Boston, MA Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 1pm 211 Alewife Brook Pkwy., Cambridge Contact: Meghan, meghan@sfalliance.org Hyannis Port, MA Sunday Feb. 12th @ 1:30pm 655 Lyannough Road Rev. JD Benson, revjd@firstparishbrewster.org Millburn, NJ Saturday, February 11th @ 6:30-6:45 pm 187 Millburn Ave. Rabbi Debra Hachen, rabbihachen@betheljc.org Hartsdale, NY Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 2pm 215 North Central Ave. Contact: Jalal, jalal.sabur@gmail.com New York City Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 2pm 138 East 14th St. Contact: Community/Farmworker Alliance, farmworkersolidarity@gmail.com New York City (second action) Friday, February 10th @ 6:00pm 675 6th Ave Between 21st and 22nd St.Community/Farmworker Alliance, campaigns@cfa-nyc.org Hartford, CT Saturday, Feb. 10 from 3-4PM. 489 New Britain Ave Chris, The Hartford Catholic Worker doucot@sbcglobal.net Orange, CT Date/time TBA 560 Boston Post Rd. Contact: Megan, megan.fountain@gmail.com Philadelphia, PA Saturday, Feb. 11th @ Noon 2121 Market St. Contact; Kate, s.kate.kelly@gmail.com Pittsburgh, PA Friday, Feb. 10th @ 5pm 6343 Penn Ave. Contact: Joyce, wagnerjm@ivaw.org Pittsburgh, PA (second action) Friday, Feb. 10th @ 5:00pm 1630 Washington Rd Jane, janeschuchert@hotmail.com Towson, MD Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 2pm 1 East Joppa Rd. Contact: Luis, luis@unitedworkers.org Washington, D.C. Sunday, Feb. 12th @ Noon 1101 25th St. NW Contact: Marley, marley@sfalliance.org Jenkintown, PA Saturday, Feb. 11th at 4pm 933 Old York Rd. Contact: Pamela Albright palbrightaat@yahoo.com Warwick, RI Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 10am 1000 Bald Hill Rd. Contact: David, providencefairfood@gmail.com South Athens, GA Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 11am 1850 Epps Bridge Pkwy Ste 331 Contact: Juan Carlos, jcardoza.oquendo@gmail.com Atlanta, GA Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 11am 931 Monroe Dr. Contact: Emiko, lauraemikosoltis@gmail.com Louisville, KY Saturday, Feb. 11th at 10:30am 4600 Shelbyville Rd., St. Matthews, KY Contact: Stephen, sbartlett@ag-missions.org Nashville, TN Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 11am 3909 Hillsboro Pike Contact: Tristan, tristan@sfalliance.org

Midwest Ann Arbor, MI Sat., Feb.11th @ 3pm 2398 East Stadium Blvd. Contact: Margaret, margaret@interfaithact.org Greater Chicago Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 2pm 483 N. Harlen Ave., Oak Park, IL Contact: Maya, maya@sfalliance.org Columbus, OH Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 2pm 6355 Sawmill Rd., Dublin, OH Contact: Sue, ohiofairfood@gmail.com Cincinnati, OH Friday, Feb. 10th @ 10:00am 7788 Montgomery Road Contact: David dspinrad@gmail.com Kansas City, MO Sunday, Feb. 12th @ Noon 8600 Ward Parkway Contact: Ashley, ashley@sfalliance.org Madison, WI Friday, Feb. 10th @ 5pm 1810 Monroe St. Contact: Son Mudanza, sonmudanza@gmail.com Milwaukee, WI Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 1pm 5600 N Port Washington Rd., Glendale Contact: Cynthia, cynthia.znw@gmail.com Lincoln, NE Friday, Feb. 10th @ 5pm 3120 Pine Lake Rd. Contact: Diane, dibamdor@gmail.com Omaha, NE Date/time TBA 10305 Pacific St. Contact: Diane, dibamdor@gmail.com St. Louis, MO Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 11am 48 Brentwood Promenade Ct. Contact: Katherine, katherinepowderly@gmail.com Southwest Albuquerque, NM Friday, Feb. 10th @ 5pm 2200 Uptown Loop NE Contact: Gaby, karlagaby04@hotmail.com West Coast Berkeley, CA Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 5pm 1885 University Ave. Contact: Damara, damara@justharvestusa.org Costa Mesa, CA Friday, Feb. 10th @ Noon 640 West 17th St. Contact:Sarah, revsarah@ocfairviewchurch.org Huntington Beach, CA Sunday, Feb. 12th @ 1pm 16821 Algonquin St. Contact: Natasha, natasha@sfalliance.org Monrovia, CA Friday, Feb. 10th @ Noon Trader Joe's Corporate HQ 800 S. Shamrock Ave. Contact: Elena, elena@interfaithact.org Oakland, CA Saturday, Feb. 11th @ 10am 3250 Lakeshore Ave. Contact: Kay, kay@sfalliance.org Pasadena, CA Date/time TBA 345 South Lake Ave. Contact: Kevin, kevin@sfalliance.org San Jose, CA Saturday, February 11th at 3:00 pm 635 Coleman Ave. Contact: Tim, jspec7@gmail.com Santa Ana, CA Date/time TBA 3329 S. Bristol St. Contact: Mariana, mariana07bruno@yahoo.com Tustin, CA Date/time TBA 12932 Newport Ave. Contact: Pedro, pnlopez@ucdavis.edu Seattle, WA Date/time TBA 4555 Roosevelt Way NE Contact: Maree, maree.ness@gmail.com

Meanwhile... More than 50,000 Nearly 62,000 people have sent emails to Trader Joe's over the past two weeks since the social media/movement website sumofus.org launched an e-action in support of the Campaign for Fair Food. Since then, moveon.org and others have picked up the action, too! If you haven't sent your own email yet, you can make your voice heard by clicking here.

January 26, 2012

In Sarasota, one student's tragic sacrifice for farm labor justice 40 years ago inspires a new generation of student activists for Fair Food today...

Dozens of students, community members hold vigil in memory of Nan Freeman, New College student killed in 1972 farmworker protest, vow to "carry her torch onward" in struggle to bring Publix "onto the right side of history"

In a moving tribute to an 18-year old New College freshman, Nan Freeman, who was fatally struck by a farm truck hauling sugar cane during a farmworker protest in Belle Glade forty years ago yesterday, New College students and Sarasota human rights activists gathered last night to honor Nan's memory and to send a message to Florida's largest grocer, Publix, pledging to "recommit ourselves with greater tenacity and dedication than ever before" to the Campaign for Fair Food.

The student organizers of last night's vigil circulated a letter to Publix CEO Ed Crenshaw, which read, in part:

Continue reading this post >>

January 16, 2012

HUGE new initiative promises to
"Move Mountains"!

"Darkness cannot drive out darkness:
only light can do that.
Hate cannot drive out hate:
only love can do that."
The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, "Strength to Love," 1963

Interfaith Action, the network of people of faith and religious institutions that partners with the CIW in the Campaign for Fair Food, has launched a pivotal new initiative designed to rally the power of prayer to move Publix from "isolation and hesitation... into communication and cooperation with the CIW." From the Interfaith Action website:

Continue reading this post >>

January 23, 2012

Neither rain, nor sleet, nor snow, nor hail...

... will keep these Fair Food activists from
their appointed rounds!

Dispatches from the frozen northern front of the Battle for Fair Food have been coming in this week, from Ohio (above) --- where a member of Ohio Fair Food wrote this past Saturday, "75 Coalition for Immokalee supporters just marched on the south campus Krogers in Columbus demanding that Krogers meet with the CIW for a penny per pound!" -- to La Grange outside of Chicago (below), where Fair Food activists protested Trader Joe's refusal to sign an agreement with the CIW and collected petition signatures in support of the Campaign, catching the eye of the local media in the process:

Continue reading this post >>

January 20, 2012

Premiering this week at the Sundance Festival...

"Payback," a new film by the award-winning Canadian documentary director Jennifer Baichwal, featuring an extensive segment on farm labor exploitation and the Campaign for Fair Food!

Adapting the 2008 best-seller "Payback" by author Margaret Atwood to film, Canadian documentary director Jennifer Baichwal and cinematographer Nick de Pencier are premiering their new film, by the same name, at the Sundance Festival this weekend. The Sundance program describes "Payback":

Continue reading this post >>

January 18, 2012

"Sum of Us" are getting tired of Trader Joe's
foot dragging on Fair Food!

Online petition calling on Trader Joe's to sign Fair Food agreement latest indication that patience with "ethical grocer" is growing short among concerned consumers...

Sum of Us, the "movement of consumers, workers and shareholders speaking with one voice to counterbalance the growing power of large corporations," has stepped into the ring in the battle to win Trader Joe's commitment to the Fair Food Program, and they've done so with a sharply-worded new online petition out today. Here's an excerpt:

Continue reading this post >>

January 11, 2012

Trader Joe's set to open first Florida store...
on Immokalee Road!

This should be interesting...

On February 10, Trader Joe's will be opening its first store in Florida. Where? About 30 miles from Immokalee, on the road that connects Immokalee to Naples.

While this is surely a coincidence, it is one that cannot be ignored, and workers from Immokalee, together with their Southwest Florida allies, are planning a warm welcome for their newest neighbor.

Continue reading this post >>

January 9, 2012

Martin Sheen pens powerful letter to Trader Joe's CEO Dan Bane in "fervent support" of the Campaign for Fair Food!

Sheen: "Frankly it is both surprising and deeply disappointing that Trader Joe's has yet to make a binding commitment to support the CIW's Fair Food Program"...

Martin Sheen (shown above with Wilson Perez of the CIW at last fall's School of the America's gathering in Columbus, Georgia, where Mr. Sheen gave a moving speech on the power of non-violent protest in the pursuit of human rights) is an Emmy Award-winning actor and widely respected activist for human rights.

And, fortunately for us, Mr. Sheen's commitment to human rights extends to the Fair Food movement, too! Late last month, as he has many times over the years before, Mr. Sheen lent his voice to the Campaign for Fair Food, calling on Trader Joe's to live up to its reputation as a progressive grocer and sign an agreement with the CIW to support the Fair Food Program.

In a letter to Trader Joe's CEO Dan Bane, Mr. Sheen wrote, in part:

"Dear Mr. Bane, I am writing to convey my fervent support for Trader Joe's signing an accord with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers to better the lives of the men and women that harvest the tomatoes sold in your company's stores... ... Frankly it is both surprising and deeply disappointing that Trader Joe's has yet to make a binding commitment to support the CIW's Fair Food Program. Given your company's progressive reputation, I imagine the overwhelming majority of Trader Joe's customers share my hope that your company will speedily join with the CIW to do its part in advancing the human rights of farmworkers." read more

You can read the letter in its entirety here.

We are extremely proud and gratified to count Mr. Sheen among the ever growing number of Fair Food activists across the country. We look forward to working more closely with him in the coming months as the focus intensifies on California-based Trader Joe's!

Click here for all the news from the previous year, A New Day in the Fields!