Dear John,

“If you die while working at the company, seven more people are ready to replace you.” That is what a Honduran melon worker heard from a representative of Fyffes’ employer-dominated union.

Our new scathing exposé: Fyffes Farms Exposed: The Fight for Justice in the Honduran Melon Fields ([link removed]), published yesterday, chronicles the long history of a billion-dollar fruit company’s human rights abuses – including wage theft and exposure to toxic chemicals – and the ongoing, four-year struggle of Honduran farmworkers fighting to organize a union, who have faced mass firings, surveillance, physical attacks and death threats.

Tweet at Fyffes, post on Facebook, or send an email ([link removed]) directly to Fyffes’ executives to demand they give melon pickers protective equipment and negotiate a legally-binding agreement with the STAS union!

While Fyffes is busy hosting politicians and making fitness videos in Ireland, melon pickers in Honduras are being laid off en masse while those who continue working are risking their lives with no protective equipment during the COVID-19 pandemic to supply U.S. supermarkets with honeydew, cantaloupe, and mini watermelons (sold under the SOL label).

Take action here to urge Fyffes to negotiate in good faith with the independent STAS union: [link removed]

The fight on the Honduran melon farms is a microcosm of the international worker struggle – a struggle against a system that keeps people in poverty while extracting massive profit for corporations. Violence against trade unionists and other human rights defenders in Central America directly contributes to a lack of decent work in the region, one of the many factors that fuels the cycle of poverty and pushes people to migrate. While every human has a right to seek asylum, they also have a right to stay in their communities, feel safe at work, and earn a living wage.

Thank you in advance for sharing our report and taking action. To hear from the farmworkers directly, please register for our webinar on May Day.

Adelante,

Gabby Rosazza
Campaigns Associate

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Please consider joining ILRF as a monthly donor to help sustain our ability to stand with labor rights defenders around the world: [link removed]

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