On the final day of the five-city, two-week “4 for Fair Food Tour,” nearly 500 protesters – equal parts farmworkers, students, and community members – wove as one through the University of Florida’s picturesque campus in a colorful and boisterous demonstration. They were fed up with the UF administration’s willingness to turn a deaf ear to students’ concerns, calling on UF President Kent Fuchs to cut the university’s contract with Wendy’s, without further delay, until Wendy’s joins fast-food industry leaders McDonald’s, Burger King, Subway, Chipotle, and Taco Bell in requiring its tomato suppliers to meet the stringent human rights standards of the Presidential medal-winning Fair Food Program.
The CIW’s sincerest thanks go out to all the allies who worked tirelessly to organize last week’s march, and all the actions of the 4 for Fair Food Tour, from Chapel Hill, North Carolina, to Ann Arbor, Michigan. The logistics of housing, feeding, and transporting a busload of souls from Immokalee (two buses, in fact, once the tour hit Gainesville!) on an odyssey covering thousands of miles, from cold climes to warm, with impressive actions and presentations at every stop along the way, cannot be overestimated. And the tour’s conclusion on Thursday in Gainesville would never have been possible without the selfless assistance of innumerable members of the vast – and fast-growing – Fair Food nation. Now safely back home in Immokalee, all of us extend our deepest gratitude to all of you.
For more photos of the event go to ciw-online.org. To read an article about the coalition’s efforts to get Wendy’s to join the Fair Food Program see The New York Times.
Lakewood United Church of Christ 