On Thursday, December 9, five UK students, two BCTC students, and three community activists delivered a total of 186 petition signatures to the management of the Euclid Avenue Kroger grocery store. We are asking Kroger to support just wages and humane working conditions for the immigrant farmworkers of Immokalee, Florida, by agreeing to pay one cent more per pound of tomatoes and to enter a code of conduct agreement opposing the sale of products made by victims of enslavement/human trafficking.The local manager took the signed letters from us and agreed to inform the national office of Kroger about our visit.
In a local campaign initiated by the UK Socialist Student Union, 186 signatures were gathered in a single week at a variety of locations, including at the University of Kentucky Student Center, the Bluegrass Community and Technical College cafeteria, the Lexington Catholic Newman Center, and local meetings of the Central Kentucky Council for Peace and Justice and of Kentuckians for the Commonwealth.
This is just one step in an ongoing campaign demanding that the supermarket industry support "fair food" and negotiate with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) farmworkers in Florida. Look for more organizing on this issue by the SSU and other local activist groups in the spring, and please contact us if you'd like to be involved.
KFTC has posted a nice blog post about the action: http://www.kftc.org/blog/archive/2010/12/09/students-and-kftc-members-demand-that-kroger-supports-workers-rights/weblogentry_view.
(Photo credit: Ondine)
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