Low Prices Often Mean Poor Working Conditions, Panel
SaysContact: John Christoffersen 212 636 7577 When a group of
poor tomato pickers decided to take on the world’s largest food
corporations to improve their working conditions more than a
decade ago, their chances of success seemed slim. “Many people
thought we were kind of crazy because they could not imagine a
change coming from the top in this way,” Gerardo Reyes said at a
Fordham University forum, “The True Cost of the Low Price: Labor
Trafficking and Consumerism,” held on March 24. |Gerardo Reyes
displays a Rights and Responsibilities pamphlet used to educate
Florida produce pickers. Photo by Michael Dames The Coalition of
Immokalee Workers in Florida persisted in their campaign . Aided
by college students who organized boycotts, Reyes said they
eventually convinced Taco Bell in 2005 to sign what the workers
call a fair food agreement—committing the company to pay farm
workers an extra penny per pound for tomatoes harvested for
growers that supply the c