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Subway agrees to pay another penny per pound for
By TRACY X. MIGUEL
NAPLES
— Subway customers will continue to “eat fresh” tomatoes picked by
Florida farmworkers.
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers reached an agreement Tuesday morning
on the first day of its scheduled 10-day protest tour against Subway.
Coalition members visited Subway’s corporate Miami headquarters on
Tuesday to demand the restaurant chain work with the coalition to ensure
fairer wages and working conditions for the workers who pick their
tomatoes.
“Subway strongly supports the farmworkers’ rights and has entered in an
agreement with the (Coalition of Immokalee Workers) to pay the
additional 1 cent per pond for tomatoes grown in the Immokalee region of
Florida,” Subway spokesman Les Winograd said.
According to the agreement signed Tuesday, Subway, the world’s largest
sandwich chain and the biggest fast-food buyer of Florida tomatoes, will
pay an additional net penny per pound to the Florida farmworkers who
harvest its tomatoes.
“Today, the fast-food industry has spoken with one voice,” Gerardo
Reyes, a member of the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, said in a
prepared statement.
“With this agreement, the four largest restaurant companies in the world
have now joined their voices to the growing call for a more modern, more
humane agricultural industry in Florida. Now it is time for others in
the fast food and supermarket industry to follow suit and for the
promise of long-overdue labor reform in Florida’s fields contained in
these agreements to be made real.”
The coalition has successfully targeted major fast-food corporations,
demanding an end to what it calls modern slavery.
Now, the coalition plans to focus on the supermarket industry, including
Wal-Mart, Julia Perkins, a Coalition of Immokalee Workers staff member,
said.
Under the agreement, Connecticut-based Subway has also agreed to have an
outside entity verify the money was passed on to workers. Subway has
more than 30,000 restaurants in 87 countries.
Subway also joined other fast-food industry leaders and the coalition in
calling on the Florida tomato industry to institute an industry-wide
penny per pound surcharge to increase wages for all Florida tomato
harvesters, according to a coalition press release.
According to a press release, collaboration also provides for a more
stringent supplier code of conduct that includes farmworker
participation in the monitoring of growers’ compliance and strict “zero
tolerance” guidelines for the most egregious labor rights violations.
Subway has taken the additional step of extending these higher standards
to the vendor code of conduct governing its entire supply chain, not
just tomatoes, according to a coalition press release.
Subway has committed its support for the development of an industry-wide
code of conduct that will create a uniform set of standards for all
Florida tomato growers and purchasers, according to a press release.
It is the fifth time that the coalition has targeted a national
fast-food chain.
Two years ago, it reached an agreement to improve wages and working
conditions for farmworkers with Taco Bell owners Yum! Brands. Earlier
this year, agreements were reached with McDonald’s restaurants and
Burger King. |