by aden
Thu Aug 10th, 2006 at 05:28:02 PM EST
"Labor trafficking is so preventable in this country [US]. That's why it's all the more outrageous that it's still existing. Because there is actually a solution, it is very clear. To end slavery, to end human trafficking, you have to end sweatshops. If the big buyers, the major corporate buyers, if they were to say "We don't ever want to see modern day slavery again in our supply chain," it would disappear."
Laura Germino
Anti-Slavery Campaign Coordinator
Coalition of Immokalee Workers
Some human trafficking experts and human rights activists believe there is a connection between the US fast food industry and modern slavery in the United States.
I have recently posted a short audio documentary on the tradio21 web site "McTrafficked: The Fast Food Industry and Modern Day Slavery in the US".
The piece centers around the Coalition of Immokalee Workers' visit to Chicago to launch their campaign against McDonald's.
The Coalition of Immokalee Workers, a Florida based farm worker organization, has helped free over 1000 people held in peonage, forced labor, debt bondage and conditions of trafficking in the United States.
"The key factor [to labor trafficking] is not people's citizenship status, it's the imbalance of power.. between the employers and the employees, and when you are in an industry where there is not a huge imbalance of power you do not see modern day slavery occurring, or human trafficking."
...
"Modern day slavery doesn't take place in a vacuum. It doesn't fall out of the sky and graft itself onto an otherwise healthy industry. It takes root in industries where there's already a wide range of labor violations, sub poverty wages, no benefits, a contingent work force with little rights. Just flip it over and look at it the other way, you would not see it in a unionized work place. You see it where there's already serious labor violations and then it takes just a little bit to have it tip over from sweatshop conditions into actual slavery, meaning when you are not able to leave even if you'd like to, when you are being held against your will."
Laura Germino
Anti-Slavery Campaign Coordinator
Coalition of Immokalee Workers
In March of this year the Coalition of Immokalee Workers' came to Chicago to launch a national campaign against McDonald's. Chicago is home to McDonald's corporate headquarters.
In 2001 the Coalition of Immokalee Workers began a national boycott of Taco bell in an effort to increase farm worker's wages and develop procedures that would lead to better working conditions. Universities around the United States pushed Taco Bell restaurants off their campuses. The US Presbyterian Church and several student organizations became national organizing forces behind the boycott.
In 2005 Taco Bell, through its parent company Yum brand foods became the only fast food restaurant to establish a working relationship with the Immokalee Workers in Florida. The Coalition's national boycott of Taco Bell ended when Taco Bell agreed to pay one additional cent per pound of tomatoes.
The additional penny per pound increases a tomato pickers wage by approximately 75%.
This year the Coalition of Immokalee Workers was awarded the Paul and Sheila Wellstone Award by the Freedom Network USA for their efforts to combat human trafficking in the United States.
In 2003 Julia Gabriel, Lucas Benitez and Romeo Ramirez of the CIW were the first US recipients of the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award. Per the RFK Human Rights Award's web site "Farm workers themselves, they [Gabriel, Benitez, and Ramirez] have become leaders in the fight to end slave labor, human trafficking and exploitation in agriculture fields across the U.S."
See the Student Farmworker Alliance for additional information on efforts related to the CIW.
