THAT'S MY WORLD . Today my link to this meme is different. It is about part of my world that I don't love.
(This picture was taken late last Summer. Back in Oregon and after one of our amost daily raids of Cyndi and Jeff's garden.)
Next season — when we're finished with some of our projects around the cottage here at Upriver – I just might have to stick a tomato plant in a pot out on our deck. (Even though we haven't gardened at all for years and didn't really plan to start again.)
Buying tomatoes when we're in Florida should be the easiest thing in the world — they grow really well here. The town of Immokolee, a few miles from where we live, is the US center for tomato farming. Many, if not most, of the fast food chains and many grocery chains buy tomatoes from commercial growers based there. However, the owners have, for years, gotten away with paying less-than-living wages to the farm workers. There is a community-based worker organization called The Coalition of Immokalee Workers that is actively trying to remedy these conditions.
A few landowners have even kept their workers in slavery. (In Immokalee there is a Museum of Modern Slavery — really). This story from GOURMET MAGAZINE tells about just such an Immokalee landowner. The trial, where several members of one family were convicted of keeping workers in slave conditions, happened when we were here last year.
After years of work on the part of the Coalition, some large purchasers have agreed to pay more for the tomatoes, with the added cost going to the Coalition for better wages. These purchasers include Taco Bell, Burger King, Mickey D's and Whole Foods. Kudos to Taco Bell and Burger King, but that's not, as a rule, where we want to get our fresh tomatoes. And the only Whole Foods in our area is over at Naples — close enough for a day trip to the beach, but not close enough for a weekly grocery buying trip. (We wish it were closer — for this and many other grocery-related reasons!)
Sadly, Publix, which is the major supermarket chain in this area (and the one closest to us) has refused to sign on. (The Coalition is asking Publix to pay one cent – ONE PENNY – more per pound for the tomatoes they buy. That money would go to raising wages and improving living conditions for the workers.).
Now, in the past we probably bought tomatoes from sources that didn't pay their workers fairly, without even thinking about where they came from. But you can't read these stories – and drive past the exit to Immokalee fairly often — without having to do something — small as it may be.
CLICK HERE to read one article that also gives the Publix side of the controversy. (I wanted to be fair.)
It's obvious which side we're on, so tomatoes have been off our shopping list except when we can go to local Farmer's Markets. But just now in yesterday's local paper, we read an article saying that six tomato vendors at a private farmer's market in Immokalee have been served with misdemeanor violations for failing to comply with food-safety rules. It seems that Florida requires tomatoes be sanitized to reduce microbial contamination and requires that they be harvested into plastic boxes. HUH?
I can't wait to visit one of the Farmer's Markets that are NOT in Immokalee to see if they comply with these regulations. I can't help but wonder.
Meanwhile — I wish I had that tomato plant out on our deck.
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Bacon's bad for us, can't buy tomatoes. Anybody for a bread and lettuce sandwich?
