Florida's Tomato Pickers Take On McDonalds

Kari Lydersen writes: Last spring, the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) won an unprecedented victory when their boycott and protests convinced Taco Bell and parent company, Yum Brands, to ensure companies from which it buys tomatoes will pay their field hands one cent more per pound and adhere to a relatively progressive workers' rights code. This fall, the CIW launched a campaign demanding McDonald's sign a comparable agreement, hoping that McDonald's, even more so than Taco Bell, could help raise wages and improve working conditions across the board.

Many Florida Unitarian Universalists had followed the struggles of the Immokalee Workers, and were elated with the agreement with Taco Bell.  But the tactics of MacDonald's is cause of great concern.

Read Kari Lydersen's article to appreciate this new tactic of corporations in their public relations war to appear to be "good citizens" while they seek to degrade the people who harvest the tomatoes, and other crops that make their business possible.