Farm workers target Trader Joe’s in campaign to shed light on working conditions

TRANSCRIPT:

Over the Labor Day weekend, farm worker advocates urged consumers to think about where their fruits and vegetables come from.  Laborers work long hours and are exposed to the sun and pesticides.  They make about $10,000 a year and have no benefits.  They're also exempt from federal protections for collective bargaining and overtime pay.  In the absence of federal protections, farm workers have launched campaigns for better wages and more humane working conditions.  With a string of victories behind them, including Taco Bell, Burger King and most recently the food service giant Sodexo, the Florida-based Coalition of Immokalee Workers is now targeting Trader Joe's.  Sam Lewis reports.

Trader Joe's image of sustainability and greenness — along with lower prices — attracts many customers who want to save money and shop responsibly.  But some critics say the company needs to pay more attention to where it gets it products. Kate Caldwell works for the National Economic and Social Rights Initiative, based in New York.

KATE CALDWELL: Many consumers, particularly consumers who go to Trader Joe’s who are often looking for food that they feel was ethically produced or sustainably produced or organically produced, are concerned about where their food comes from and want to be part of changing the food industry in the U.S.  They care that the tomato they’re eating was not picked by an enslaved laborer in Florida. There have been seven federally-prosecuted cases of slavery in the last thirteen years in Florida.

Caldwell and other activists accuse Trader Joe's of buying tomatoes from growers who mistreat farm workers.  And so far, the growing grocery chain has resisted raising the price they pay for tomatoes by one penny more per pound.  Charlene Obernower is a member of the Community/Farmworker Alliance, an ally of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers.

CHARLENE OBERNOWER: We've sent them letters asking them to negotiate with us and we haven't had any response whether positive or negative so we are hoping that with this protest it will initiate some response from them nationally and they'll start to negotiate with us.

According to the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, farm workers picking tomatoes sold in Trader Joe's stores earn as little as 40-50 cents per 32-pound bucket of tomatoes harvested, and their wages have not risen since 1978. Workers must pick nearly 2.5 tons of tomatoes in order to earn $50.  If Trader Joe's increases what it pays for tomatoes, workers wages would nearly double. Trader Joe's would not agree to an interview for this story.

Oscar Otzoy is a farm worker in South Florida and an organizer with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. He says they often work 10-12 hours a day and are subject to the abuse of contractors.

OSCAR OTZOY: [Translated] We're out there working without a lot of the benefits and protections that you would expect to find in other industries.  For example, if we speak up and we don’t want to continue working when they are spraying pesticides on this field and we say something about that we run the risk of not being hired again.

Last month, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and other groups organized a protest outside a Trader Joe's in Manhattan in an effort to step-up pressure on the company.  Audrey Sasson with the Community Farmworker Alliance helped to organize the protest.

AUDREY SASSON: There’s a lot of interest in terms of the farm bureau and big business wanting to keep those wages down so when we are talking about agriculture, wages are the one place where growers feel that they can really save because all the other inputs they have no control over.  But workers, they exploit because they can — there is no protection for them.

Eight retail food corporations have already signed the Fair Food Agreement with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers including: Taco Bell, Burger King, McDonald’s, Subway, Whole Foods and the food service companies Sodexo, Aramark and Compass Group.

In addition to improving wages, The agreement creates a code of conduct which holds buyers accountable for any cases of modern day slavery and obliges them to take action.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers is also pressuring Publix, Ahold, Kroger and WalMart to join the campaign for fair food.

- Sam Lewis, FSRN