Dear John,
Thirty years ago farmworkers toiling in the tomato fields of Immokalee, FL, rose up and began the fight for dignity on the job and freedom from forced labor. What started as localized strikes against individual farms and abusive crew leaders expanded to nationwide pressure campaigns against massive food corporations whose overwhelming purchasing power drove prices at the farmgate ever lower, and in so doing, set conditions in the fields from afar.
Those nationwide campaigns have been sustained for more than two decades now by a network of allies like you, who have generously given time and financial resources to help farmworkers secure a series of breathtaking victories, victories that gave birth to the groundbreaking Fair Food Program.
Now thanks to those efforts, the fields once known as ground-zero for modern-day slavery, are now called the “best work environment in U.S. agriculture” on the front page of the New York Times. Today the CIW operates the Fair Food Program, which prevents the very worst of human rights abuses — modern-day slavery, sexual assault, child labor, and physical abuses — and has reduced lesser violations to a trickle, in the fields of over a dozen crops in ten states and three countries, and we continue to expand every single day.
Over the last week, the Fair Food Program received gifts from over 300 donors totalling over $45,000 — and that’s not counting checks that may not have arrived yet — and unlocking an additional $30,000 in unrestricted support. This money is critical to ensuring we can continue the fight for dignity for all farmworkers.
From the bottom of our hearts, thank you for defending the human rights of farmworkers this holiday season! And if you have not yet made your gift, it is not too late. While we hit our initial goal, each and every dollar provided to the Fair Food Program helps to secure the basic rights and dignity of farmworkers across this nation, and indeed, the rest of the world.
With gratitude,
Your friends at the Coalition of Immokalee Workers
