Raising the price of tomatoes by 1 cent a pound would change farmworkers’ lives. Trader Joe’s said no. But first, a none-too-subtle word from our sponsor Click here to place an order with Amazon Click here to place an order with Barnes & Noble Click here to place an order with Borders Click here to place an […]
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Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, tomatoes, Trader Joe's
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Last week, I attended tomato school. Sitting in a room at a packing plant near Immokalee in southwest Florida with about 50 migrant laborers, I learned that I had a right to earn a minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, could take regular breaks in a shady area provided by the farm—including a lunch break. […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, tomatoes, Tomatoland
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My protest marching skills are a bit rusty, having last been put to use in 1968 on behalf of Eugene McCarthy and his thwarted bid for the Democratic presidential nomination. But on a bitter afternoon in Boston recently, I sloshed through a few inches of slushy snow with more than 900 supporters of the Coalition […]
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| Tags: Ahold, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Giant, Publix, Stop and Shop, tomatoes, Trader Joe's
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Just a little over a week after Pacific Tomato Growers, one of the top five tomato producers in Florida, came aboard the Coalition of Immokalee Workers’ Fair Food effort (see previous post), the state’s largest producer has followed suit. Here is the press release: With the the 2010 tomato season just around the corner, momentum […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers
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Coalition of Immokalee Workers Photograph A few months ago, I attended an amateur boxing match in Immokalee, Fla., an agricultural community in the southwestern part of the state. It didn’t look like it was going to be a fair fight. In one corner was a strapping fellow in his late teens or early 20s. […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, tomatoes
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Thanks, Ruth, Doc, Rux, and you, too, Jim Driving from Naples, Florida, the nation’s second-wealthiest metropolitan area, to Immokalee takes less than an hour on a straight road. You pass houses that sell for an average of $1.4 million, shopping malls anchored by Tiffany’s and Saks Fifth Avenue, manicured golf courses. Eventually, gated communities […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, James Beard Awards
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Chalk up another one for the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), the Florida-based community organization that has been trying for decades to improve the grim lot of migrant tomato pickers, most of whom toil for less than minimum wage. This week, ARAMARK, the giant corporation that supplies food to universities, hospitals, stadiums, and other institutions […]
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| Tags: ARAMARK, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, farmworkers, Publix
| 2 comments
With faux jungles full of parrots, pods of under-water-ballet-performing mermaids, and parks cashing in on every conceivable theme, it would seem that the last thing Florida needs is yet another “attraction.” But if you’re in the Sunshine State during the next six weeks, I strongly urge you to visit the new Florida Modern-Day Slavery Museum. […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, Florida, Florida Modern-Day Slavery Museum, Slavery
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Photograph by Scott Robertson courtesey of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers Following this week’s prolonged cold snap in Florida, news reports bemoaned the prospect of higher prices for orange juice and crops such as strawberries, citrus, and tomatoes. The state’s governor (and United States Senate hopeful) Charlie Christ promptly issued an executive order to […]
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| Tags: Coalition of Immokalee Workers, farm workers, tomatoes
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After more that 15 years of petitions, demonstrations, hunger strikes, and lobbying efforts, members of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), a group trying to alleviate the abysmal labor conditions in Florida’s tomato fields (including slavery), take adversity as a given in their battle to secure living wages from the giant corporations that control the […]
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| Tags: agriculture, Coalition of Immokalee Workers, labor, Publix, tomatoes
| 7 comments
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