Chipotle: Greenwashing or just green?

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The above picture is from a local Chipotle.  The poster reads:

“I hope all of our customers see this movie. The more they know about where their food comes from the more they’ll appreciate about what we do.”

If you go to the website, Chipotle urges you to see a free screening of Food, Inc.  I can’t wait to see  the movie, but does Chipotle really qualify as a fast food chain that that should get props from Michael Pollan or Eric Schlossler?  Or is this another example of a corporation greenwashing?

There is no doubt that Chipotle is way ahead of most fast food.  Check this blog out for more info about what the chain is doing right.

But all isn’t right.  I’m sure the workers who make the burritos are paid nowhere near a living wage.  More so,  Chipotle refuses to have labor standards for its tomato growers.  What kind of message is that? Does Chipotle really care that are pigs are cheated humanely but do not care  about the labor rights and civil rights  of the actual people who pick the tomatoes for their salsas?

McDonald’s hamburgers and Chipotle’s burritos earn about 45 cents for every 32-pound container of tomatoes they pick, a subpoverty wage that has remained stagnant for almost 30 years.

Here is a recent summary of the situation from the The Nation:

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers has made great organizing strides and has succeeded in convincing numerous commercial giants, including both Burger King and Taco Bell, to increase wages, benefits and observe a strict set of guidelines outlining workplace safety rules.

Chipotle, however, the country’s fastest-growing fast food chain, has resisted efforts by farm-workers demanding a lasting commitment to ending the brutal exploitation in Florida’s fields.

Filed under: Food Independence Day, Immigration, Mexico, POlitics, agriculture, community organizing, farming, film, human rights, progressive , agriculture, chipotle, eric schlossler, farmworkers, florid, florida, food, food standards, human rights, immokalee, immokalee workers, inc, labor, living wage, michael pollan, organic farming, social justice, taco bell, the labor movement, the nation, tomatos, unions, workers

OSCAR NOMINATED FILMMAKER COMING TO INDY FOR FOOD INDEPENDENCE DAY

Indianapolis, May 26, 2009- On Thursday, July 2, Earth House, 237 N. East St., will host Food Independence Day, a celebration of local organic agriculture and food. Oscar-nominated filmmaker (Best Documentary, 2008) Scott Kennedy Hamilton will present his award winning film, The Garden, at 7:30 p.m. Doors open at 4 p.m. The celebration will feature exhibits from local farmers, community gardeners and organizations working on food, sustainability and justice issues. There will also be live music, activities for kids and an affordable all local, organic dinner.

The Garden follows the story of a 14-acre community farm located in South Central Los Angeles, the largest of its kind in the United States. Started as a form of healing after the devastating L.A. riots in 1992, the South Central Farmers created a miracle in one of the country’s most blighted neighborhoods. “The Garden tells the story of the country’s largest urban farm, backroom deals, land developers, green politics, money, poverty, power and racial discord, exploring the fault lines in American society,” Hamilton said.

Food Independence Day is part of a nationwide effort to get families and politicians to celebrate the July 4th weekend with local and sustainable foods. This is a great opportunity for us in Central Indiana to celebrate Independence Day and support our local small farms,” Kate Lamont, Earth House general manager said. Earth House is located inside Lockerbie Central United Methodist Church, on the corner of New York and East Streets in downtown Indianapolis. Earth House is home to an all organic and fair-trade coffee shop, art gallery, media lab, wellness studio and performing arts space. Each Thursday, Earth House hosts a movie night. Major Earth House partners include Lockerbie Central United Methodist Church, Alliance for Democracy and the Indianapolis Peace and Justice Center.

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If you’d like more information about this topic, or to schedule an interview with Scott Kennedy Hamilton, please call Mike Oles at 317-354-3207

Filed under: Earth House, Indiana, Indianapolis, Lockerbie Central United Methodist Church, community, community organizing, environment, farming, film , Earth House, event, film, Food Independence Day, Indianapolis, L.A. riots, lockerbie central united methodist, Los Angeles, POlitics, poverty, press release, Scott Kennedy Hamilton, south central, The Garden

Swine Flu and factory farms and the corporate media

Time Magazine tells us “Swine Flu: Don’t Blame the Pigs.”   The article is interesting and gives a brief history of the influenza virus and its relation to livestock.  

All of this made the flu virus a tenacious foe from the outset, but once humans invented farming and learned to cultivate animals, we made a bad situation much worse. All at once, chickens, ducks and pigs — which never had much to do with one another — began living cheek to jowl in high numbers and often unsanitary conditions. Farm families and people working in live markets then began mingling with the critters. That’s a pathogenic speed blender, and the viruses have taken full advantage of it. “It’s really an ecological issue,” says Daszak.

The problem is that the article never mentions the rise of factory farming as an incubator of some scary disease.   Wow, our corporate media doesn’t really want to go there.  Though no clear links have been established yet, but circumstantial evidence points to a strong possibility that the roots of this pandemic can be found in giant U.S. operated factory farms in Mexico.  Here is one blogger’s take:  

The cause is not yet known, but many speculate that this deadly virus could be linked to factory farming. When the CDC and the USDA conduct their investigation in Mexico, they will most likely start with the industrial scale pig farms (“confined animal feeding operations” or CAFOs) that have been growing in numbers over the last decade. With the draw of cheap labor and land, American pig conglomerates have been opening up giant swine CAFOs in Mexico, including dozens around Mexico City, Puebla and Veracruz (where the outbreak is believed to have started).

Filed under: Mexico, agriculture, environment, farming, flu pandemic, swine flu , CDC, confined animal feeding operations, corporation, disease, environment, factory farm, factory farmin, farming, flu, hogs, influenza, Mexico, pandemic, pigs, Smithfield, swine flu, Time magazine, United States