Tomato Workers Need Your Support in Burger King Campaign

[Omaha Steve]

http://blog.aflcio.org/2007/06/12/tomato-workers-need-your-support-in-burger-king-campaign/

Tomato Workers Need Your Support in Burger King Campaign

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) asks us to post this call to action for workers who pick tomatoes for the nation’s fast-food industry.

Just two months ago, farm workers from southwest Florida, represented by the CIW, won a groundbreaking agreement with fast-food giant McDonald’s to improve wages and working conditions in the fields that supply the world’s largest restaurant chain with its tomatoes.



The McDonald’s agreement builds and expands upon an earlier agreement won by the CIW and its allies after a four-year boycott of Taco Bell, part of the giant restaurant company Yum! Brands Inc., and sets a clear path to real rights and decent pay for farm workers.

Miami-based Burger King, the world’s second-largest burger chain, has rejected working with the CIW to improve farm worker wages and conditions, even though it recently announced an initiative to improve the living conditions of farm animals in its supply chain. Burger King still refuses to agree to the principles signed onto by Yum! and McDonald’s. Rather than pay tomato workers a decent wage and improve working conditions, Burger King claims it’s not possible to institute those same principles in their supply chain.

Instead, Burger King announced its own plan to address farm worker poverty. In a press statement earlier this year, Burger King declared:

We have spoken to CIW representatives about our interest in recruiting interested Immokalee workers into the Burger King system. We have offered to send Burger King Corporation recruiters to the area to speak with the CIW and with workers themselves about permanent, full-time employment at Burger King restaurants. Burger King Corporation offers ongoing professional training and advancement opportunities around the country for both entry-level and skilled employee jobs, and we are hopeful the CIW will accept our offer.

FULL story at link.

[glowing]

1. Well, that's it... no more Burger King ever.. not that I go anyway.