The Taco Bell Boycott Is Over!

(The following is excerpted from an article whose full text is viewable at www.pcusa.org.)

The fast-food conglomerate Yum! Brands, Inc. announced on March 8 that it will pay 1 cent more for each pound of tomatoes it buys for use in its 6,500 Taco Bell restaurants, and will buy only from growers who pass the penny surcharge on to the field workers. In return, workers called off the three-year national consumer boycott of Taco Bell, resulting in a spirited celebration in front of the national offices of the Presbyterian Church (USA). The PC(USA) played a key role in brokering a settlement.

Workers who now earn 40-45 cents for each 32-pound bucket of tomatoes they harvest will soon make at least 72 cents per bucket—an increase of 60 to 80 percent. The additional penny will help lift some of the nation’s lowest-paid workers out of poverty.

Former President Jimmy Carter said in a prepared statement that the farmworkers can celebrate the model of corporate responsibility that their movement has created. Carter assisted in discussions with Yum! and the workers through the Carter Center, which works for human rights around the world. “I now call others in the industry to follow Taco Bell’s lead to help the tomato farmworkers,” Carter said in his statement.