Florida farm workers travel coast to coast
'BOYCOTT TACO BELL!'
By Dianne Mathiowetz
Atlanta
Some 90 Florida farm workers and their supporters have begun
a 15-city cross-country tour to call for the end of sweatshop
labor in the fields. The group hopes that this "Taco Bell Truth
Tour" will educate the public about the wretched poverty and
dangerous working conditions farm workers endure while a
multi-billion-dollar fast-food industry profits from their
exploitation.
Starting in Tampa, Fla., on Feb. 28, the tour passes through
Atlanta, Chicago, Denver, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, and
other cities before reaching Irvine, Calif.--Taco Bell
headquarters.
On March 10, dozens of organizations will join it to hold
Rise Up 2002, a daylong, movement-building conference in Los
Angeles. The next day, demonstrators will mass in front of Taco
Bell's corporate offices in Irvine.
These Florida workers harvest the tomatoes used by the
fast-food restaurant chain. They are paid about 40 cents for
every 32-lb. bucket of tomatoes they pick. This translates into
about $50 for two tons of tomatoes.
The predominately Mexican, Haitian, Guatemalan and Mayan
Indian immigrant workers earn about $6,600 a year, with no
overtime pay, health insurance, vacation, sick pay or pension.
They are exposed to pesticides, work long hours under the hot
sun, and are constantly stooping and lifting heavy buckets.
Six L's owns the fields in southwest Florida, the biggest
tomato-producing area in the U.S. The company has refused to
recognize all attempts by workers to organize a union.
Management has also ignored demands for improved wages and
better conditions in the fields and company-owned housing
camps.
Surrounded by barbed wire, these camps are little more than
shacks where 10 to 12 workers are crowded into cell-like rooms.
They lack hot water and decent sanitary facilities. They are
located far from any town. Company guards monitor who enters
and leaves. These conditions are modern-day slavery.
Profits subsidized by poverty
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers formed in 1997. It joined
organizing already begun by Lucas Benitez with community,
religious, student and labor support.
The CIW has carried out a number of bold and creative
campaigns to bring attention to the struggle of Florida farm
workers.
In 1998 six members of CIW conducted a month-long hunger
strike. In February 2000, the Immokalee workers marched 230
miles from Ft. Meyers to Orlando, through Florida's fruit- and
vegetable-growing region. In January 2001, thousands
demonstrated in Tallahassee, the state capital, to demand
justice for farm workers.
Discovering that Taco Bell was the primary purchaser of the
tomatoes, the CIW contacted the billion-dollar fast-food giant
to ask for its assistance in improving the lives of the farm
workers. By paying one penny per pound more for tomatoes, wages
for the Immokalee workers would almost double.
But Taco Bell bosses declared they had nothing to do with
the pay or working conditions of Six L employees and that they
would not even meet with the workers to discuss the issue.
The CIW's response was to launch the "Boycott the Bell"
campaign on April 1, 2001. As Romeo Ramirez, a Florida tomato
picker states, "We as farm workers are tired of subsidizing
Taco Bell's profits with our poverty."
Over the last 10 months, boycott support groups organized on
dozens of campuses and in cities across the country have held
informational leafleting and picket lines at Taco Bell
locations.
Students at Duke University and Notre Dame successfully
prevented the establishment of Taco Bell outlets on campus. CIW
members have spoken at meetings and conferences, including the
recent protests against the World Economic Forum in New York
City.
Just as the tour was about to begin, Taco Bell announced it
would meet with the CIW on March 11. Lucas Benitez stressed
that this is the result of all the support shown so far for the
Florida farm workers' struggle. He said it affirms their
confidence that with the unity of the people, they will
win.
Reprinted from the March 14, 2002, issue of
Workers World newspaper
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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Email: ww@workers.org
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