 "Photo: Chris Kominczak, Daily Texan Staff")
The ripe, red, Florida-grown tomatoes in your next burger, taco or burrito might be picked by unfairly compensated immigrant workers, according to a coalition of Florida farm workers.
More than 50 immigrant workers, UT students and labor advocates gathered in front of Chipotle on the Drag on Wednesday to protest what they call “human slavery” of Florida tomato pickers. The groups are asking national fast-food chains to pay an extra one cent per pound on tomatoes so farm workers can make suitable living wages.
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers, along with UT’s Student Farmworker Alliance, will visit Chipotle’s headquarters in Denver during their nationwide tour.
During a U.S. Senate hearing in April on working conditions for Florida farm workers, McDonald’s and Yum! Brands, which includes Taco Bell, Pizza Hut, KFC, Long John Silver’s and A&W, agreed to pay the one-cent increase per pound of tomatoes, but the money never got to the workers. When the extra money was briefly given to workers, the Florida Tomato Growers Exchange, which does not advocate the additional money being paid directly to workers, implemented a $100,000 fine for any grower that paid workers extra. The exchange is discouraging growers, McDonald’s and Yum! Brands from paying the increase.
Mark Rodriguez, leader of the Immokalee coalition, said Chipotle refuses to sit down with the coalition and agree on the code of conduct of growers and buyers and a one-cent-per-pound price increase. He said Chipotle is being hypocritical by using the slogan “food with integrity.”
“We’re tired of hearing about how Chipotle treats animals. What about the slave labor of immigrants who pick tomatoes?” he said.
The marketing director for Austin Chipotles and managers from the Guadalupe location refused to comment and directed interviews to corporate headquarters.
“Chipotle is paying the penny per pound more for Florida tomatoes, and we support the CIW’s [Coalition of Immokalee Workers] conditions for farm workers. We have not signed an agreement stating that,” said the company’s spokesman Jim Adams. He refused to comment further.
Biomedical engineering junior Rebecca Fingerhut said Chipotle’s protest and labor practices will not deter her from eating there again.
“I never gave it thought before,” she said. “I don’t care about the workers. I’m going to eat here anyway.”
Gerardo Reyes has picked tomatoes in Florida fields for nine years and helped lead the protest.
“We don’t have sick days or get paid overtime,” he said. “We are guaranteed no benefits. In a normal job situation, this would be unacceptable.”
Since 1997, there have been seven Florida labor slavery cases tried in federal court. In January, a federal grand jury indicted Cesar and Geovanni Navarrete on charges of conspiracy, peonage and involuntary servitude. The indictment alleges the two men held tomato workers in locked U-Haul trucks, tied and beat those who tried to escape and charged $5 to shower with a garden hose or bucket.
Rodriguez said cases such as these are why the coalition is fighting so hard to get the one-cent increase, which would raise the average farm worker’s yearly income from $10,000 to $17,000.
“Tomato pickers have been paid the same wage since 1978,” Rodriguez said. “In what other industry can you find that? None.”
