Jeff Enright, Senior Vice President, Supply Chain, Stop & Shop
Andrea Astrachan, Vice President of Consumer Affairs, Stop & Shop
c/o Ahold USA
1385 Hancock Street
Quincy, MA 02169

Dear Mr. Enright and Ms. Astrachan:

Greetings, and blessings from the Massachusetts Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice. We request a meeting with you to discuss the measures Stop & Shop and your parent company, Ahold, can take right now to ensure human rights and fair wages for the men and women who harvest the tomatoes sold in your stores. Specifically, we ask Stop & Shop and Ahold to work with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) to ensure fair wages and working conditions for the farm workers who pick the tomatoes you purchase.

Our organization represents thousands of people of faith-clergy, lay ministers, seminary students, and faith-based activists-from dozens of Massachusetts religious communities. They are customers at Stop & Shop, and they are conscientious consumers.

And they are appalled that Florida tomato pickers are so thoroughly exploited and treated so miserably. These workers are mired in poverty because they have not received a significant raise in over 30 years. They have been deprived of the benefits, protections, and workplace rights that many of us take for granted. Our religious communities were shocked to learn that some unfortunate tomato pickers have been beaten and chained like slaves.

But people of faith are also people of hope. They believe that the hand of God is at work in the movement for farm worker justice. They rejoice in the precedent-setting agreements that Yum Brands, Burger King, McDonald’s, and Subway reached with the CIW to improve wages and enforce a code of conduct for fair conditions in their tomato supply chains. They are encouraged by the news that two major growers, Pacific Tomato Growers and Six L’s, will join the Campaign for Fair Food and honor the penny-per-pound wage increase and the code of conduct.

The religious community is of one accord with community activists, labor leaders, and immigrant organizers-it is time for supermarkets to follow the example set by Whole Foods and come to an agreement with CIW to purchase tomatoes from socially responsible growers that pay and treat farm workers fairly.

We believe it is time for Stop & Shop and Ahold to listen to its customers. The moral authority and the purchasing power of the religious community should not be ignored. We believe it is time for Stop & Shop and Ahold to work together with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers.

Our repeated requests to meet with Harriet Hentges, vice president of corporate responsibility and sustainability for Ahold USA, have met with frustration. We hope you will respond speedily to this request. You may reach me at (617) 840-5860 or info@massinterfaith.org. Thank you for your concern, and blessings.

In faith and solidarity,

Anthony Zuba, M.Div.
Massachusetts Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice

Massachusetts Interfaith Committee for Worker Justice
145 Tremont Street, Suite 202
Boston, MA 02111
(617) 840-5860 (cell)
(617) 316-0451 (office)