Poultry has replaced beef and pork as the most sought-after type of meat in the U.S. The poultry industry has been growing at a terrific pace in the last couple of decades, with sales and earnings skyrocketing for companies. Unfortunately, the processing plant workers, chicken catchers, and growers have not shared in these profits. Real earnings for poultry workers have declined in the past ten years. Many plants have relocated to the south and southeast—primarily to “right-to-work” states with weaker labor laws—usually to rural, isolated areas with little other employment. Increasing numbers of the plant workers are recently-arrived immigrants, mostly from Latin America, who speak little English and are unaware of their basic rights. Plant workers have been harassed and even fired for raising complaints about working conditions, and for participating in union organizing campaigns. Our goal is to organize people of faith, and people of conscience in general, to work for a just poultry industry. We network with clergy and lay people, community activists, labor unions, medical professionals, legal advocates, and others to support poultry workers’ basic human rights, civil rights, and their right to organize.
Industry Overview: A Bad Industry Getting Worse
A recent investigation by the U.S. Department of Labor (DOL) shows that our nation’s poultry industry continues to violate wage and hour laws with respect to their processing plant workers. An investigation completed several years ago by the DOL showed that 60% of the selected plants had violated wage and hour laws. The follow-up investigation completed late last year (2000) reveals that 100% of the plants selected had wage and hour violations. The violations included failure to pay workers for all of the hours they worked, and failure to pay proper overtime. We have helped workers get access to legal advice on potential violations.
Catholic Bishops Issue Public Call for Change
The disregard for human rights and worker rights has prompted 41 of 47 Roman Catholic bishops of the South to sign a pastoral letter about our nation’s poultry industry, expressing concern about the lack of justice in the industry. It was released in November, 2000. The document, Voices and Choices; A pastoral letter from the Catholic Bishops of the South (published in both English and Spanish) calls for people of conscience to work together to bring justice to our country’s poultry industry. The bishops site workers’ stories of serious workplace injuries that went unheeded and untreated by companies, and of workers not being allowed to take bathroom breaks, even in situations where they were feeling ill.
The Dominating Companies
The biggest five poultry companies control the lion’s share of the industry: Tyson Foods, Perdue, Goldkist, Conagra, and Pilgrim’s Pride. Tyson, of Springdale, Arkansas, is the world’s largest fully integrated poultry processing company, with annual sales of $7 billion. Though Tyson spends a small fortune to maintain a favorable public image, the Corporate Crime Reporter magazine cited Tyson as having seven worker deaths in 1999, earning Tyson the dubious distinction of a place in the Reporter’s top ten list of Worst Corporations in 1999.
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For more information or to join the movement for justice in our nation’s poultry industry:
Contact Elisabeth Solomon, Public Policy Director, at (773) 728-8400, ext. 42.
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Poultry Links and Resources The Poultry Worker Justice Campaign Brochure (text only) DOL Poultry Investigation Report United Food & Commercial Workers International Union (UFCW) Catholic Poultry Pastoral Georgia Poultry Justice Alliance (GPJA)
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