As part of the Socialist Party’s Fair Food/Immigrant Worker Solidarity Campaign, the Socialist Party of Michigan will be holding an informational picket in front of a Flint McDonalds in solidarity with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. Anyone who supports this cause is encouraged to participate in this demonstration. Details are below:
Saturday January 13th
2:00PM
McDonalds at G3060 Miller Rd. Flint, MI 48507
(between 1-75 and S. Ballenger Hwy).
Click Here to Download the Event Flyer for Printing and Distribution
Farmworkers labor for sub-poverty wages without the right to organize, the right to overtime pay, or benefits of any kind. Pickers for Florida-based tomato companies earn 40-45 cents for every 32-lb. bucket of tomatoes that they pick. At this rate, a farmworker must pick 2 tons of tomatoes to earn just $50 in one day. In the most extreme cases, workers endure situations of modern – day slavery.
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW), an organization of mainly Mexican,
Guatemalan and Haitian farmworkers, has been organizing for over a decade to end sweatshop conditions in Florida’s fields. After a four-year boycott, the CIW reached an unprecedented agreement with Taco Bell in 2005 that established important new precedents for human rights in the fast-food industry. Following the boycott victory, the CIW turned to fast-food giant McDonald’s.
McDonald’s clearly knows how to do better. The fast-food giant recently announced an agreement to purchase only fair-trade coffee for over 650 of its restaurants. Yet McDonald’s refuses to pay even a penny more per pound for its tomatoes so that Florida farmworkers can earn a better wage. Likewise, McDonald’s requires its toy suppliers to respect minimal internationally recognized labor rights, including the right to overtime pay and the right to organize, but refuses to require its tomato suppliers in Florida to respect those same fundamental rights