Workers’ rights in the U.S. poultry processing industry

Websites

UUSC Hotwire, a human rights weblog.
An ongoing record of firsthand accounts from UUSC staff members and event participants, UUSC Hotwire is a great way to stay informed about UUSC's programmatic work.

The Cyberactivist
Blog of former poultry worker Virgil Butler, with chilling memoirs of his experiences witnessing animal cruelty and worker exploitation on the killing room floor.


Magazine and newspaper articles

Finger-Licking Bad: How Poultry Producers are Ravaging the Rural South (PDF)
By Suzi Parker, Grist Magazine, February 21, 2006.

Poultry Workers Fight Corporate ‘Foul Play’ (PDF)
By Mike Quinn, People’s Weekly World online newspaper.

To Make A Tender Chicken, Poultry Workers Pay the Price (PDF)
By Barbara Goldoftas, Dollars and Sense, Issue #242, July/August 2002. First published in September of 1989, this report of abuses in the poultry industry led to OSHA prosecutions of two of the exposed companies for health and safety violations.

Union Organizers at Poultry Plants in South Find Newly Sympathetic Ears
By Steve Greenhouse. New York Times, September 6, 2005.

Center to Help Empower Workers
By Lora Hines. The Clarion-Ledger, Jackson, Mississippi, June 4, 2004.

Reports

Human Health Implications of "Live Hang" of Chickens and Turkeys on Slaughterhouse Workers (PDF)
The Humane Society of the United States Report

Injury and Injustice – America’s Poultry Industry (PDF)
United Food and Commercial Workers fact sheet.

Blood, Sweat, and Fear: Workers’ Rights in U.S. Meat and Poultry Plants (PDF)
Human Rights Watch report.

Safety in the U.S. Meat and Poultry Industry, while Improving, Could Be Further Strengthened (PDF)
By the U.S. Government Accountability Office Report Workplace Safety and Health, as submitted to the ranking minority member, Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions, U.S. Senate.

The Disposable Workforce: A Worker’s Perspective (PDF)
A documentation study conducted by the Public Justice Center of working conditions in Delmarva poultry processing plants.

Related books and documentaries

Chicken: The Dangerous Transformation of America’s Favorite Food
By Steve Striffler. An anthropologist’s expose on the U.S. poultry processing industry.

Letters From the Other Side
A documentary by Heather Courtney that "offers a fresh perspective, painting a complex portrait of families torn apart by economics, communities dying at the hands of globalization, and governments incapable or unwilling to do anything about it." An honest examination of the lives and families of undocumented economic migrants – the very same preyed upon by the U.S. poultry industry.

Voices and Choices: A Pastoral Message on Justice in the Workplace from the Catholic Bishops of the South
Statement from Southern Catholic bishops on poultry worker justice.

The Way We Eat: Why Our Food Choices Matter
By Pete Singer and Jim Mason.

Gulf Coast workers' rights

Reading resources

Convening on Workers' Rights in the Gulf Coast: Understanding and Linking Organizational Activity since Hurricane Katrina (PDF)
A report on workers' rights in the Gulf Coast produced after a conference co-sponsored by UUSC and Oxfam America.

Summary report on convening on workers' rights in the Gulf Coast (PDF)

Resources for funders (PDF)

And Injustice for All: Workers’ Lives in the Reconstruction of New Orleans (PDF)

Good Work and Fair Contracts: Making Gulf Coast Reconstruction Work for Local Residents and Businesses (PDF)
Gulf Coast Commission for Reconstruction Equity, sponsored by Interfaith Worker Justice and Good Jobs First, February 2006.

AFL-CIO $1B Labor-Sponsored Gulf Coast Revitalization Program (PDF)
June 14, 2006.

Review of Katrina Federal Legislation: Contractor Preferences & Local Hiring (PDF)
Brennan Center for Justice and Partnership for Working Families.

UUSC: Economic justice and immigration (PDF)

Partners/Organizations

Interfaith Worker Justice: Policy project on Gulf Coast workers' rights
A UUSC Rights in Humanitarian Crisis/Economic Justice partner project.

Advancement Project
A UUSC Rights in Humanitarian Crisis partner.

Brennan Center: New York University

Workers Rights and Organizing in Maquiladoras

Center for the Promotion and Defense of Human Labor Rights.
Ceprodehl has been a partner of UUSC’s Economic Justice Program since 2005.

STITCH
Building a network of women unionists, activists, and workers throughout the United States and Canada, STITCH has been a partner of UUSC’s economic justice program since 2005.

Maquila Solidarity Network (MSN)
A labor and women’s rights advocacy organization, MSN supports UUSC economic justice partners. Their website provides news, updates, action alerts, and policy briefs – a wealth of information on maquilas worldwide. See their coverage of UUSC partner Martin Barrios.

Clean Clothes Campaign is an international campaign to improve working conditions in the global garment industry. The CCC tries to raise awareness and mobilize consumers to hold multinational corporations responsible for the production of their goods and for how they treat their workers.

The International Labor Rights Fund documents labor rights abuses and campaigns to hold corporations responsible for their business and production practices.

Human Rights Watch is an international organization that leads the struggle for human rights worldwide, vigilantly investigating and exposing rights abuses, enlisting allies, and challenging governments and corporations to uphold rights laws. You can download an essential HRW background guide to human and labor rights in Mexico (PDF).

Amnesty International provides analysis and action alerts on the current human rights situation in Mexico, where two of UUSC's partners, Ceprodehl and the Commission for Human and Labor Rights of the Tehuacan Valley, are located.

Reports and Analysis

The Maquila in Guatemala: Facts and Trends
This and other excellent resources and background guides can be found here.

The World Bids Farewell to the Multi-Fiber Arrangement (PDF)
A report analyzing the impact of the end of the Multi-Fiber Agreement, an event which has had a substantial negative impact on the textile industry (and, consequently, textile workers) in Mexico and Central America.

Companies Will Run from U.S. and Mexico to China, India, Vietnam (PDF)
This article from Truthout.org analyzes the impact of the end of the Multi-Fiber Agreement on low-wage workers in Mexico and the United States.

Maquiladoras at a Glance (PDF)
Fact sheet on the Mexican maquiladora industry, produced by www.corpwatch.org.

Workers' rights and organizing in the informal sector

Reports

Strengthening Workers Rights Worldwide: Street Vendors and Informal Traders in Kenya (PDF)
UUSC Rights Now newsletter, Spring 2006.

KENASVIT Official Newsletter (PDF), Vol 1 Issue 1, April 2006.

Progress of the World’s Women, 2005 (PDF)
Published by the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM), this report offers a brief case study of the KENASVIT alliance as given by Dr. Winnie Mitullah, KENASVIT director.

The Informal Economy: Women on the Front Line (PDF)
Trade Union World Briefing, International Confederation of Free Trade Unions, March 2004.

Decent Work and the Informal Economy (PDF)
Report produced by the International Labour Organization and approved by the International Labour Conference in 2002.

Websites

Global Labor Strategies
A great resource for commentary on the global labor movement. From contingent work to labor rights in China to unionization, this blog covers it all.

National Labor Committee
An organization that researches sweatshops and abusive labor situations in clothing factories of multinational corporations worldwide.

StreetNet
An international alliance of informal trade and street vendor groups working on leadership development, network formation, and worker empowerment.

Women in Informal Employment: Organizing and Globalizing (WIEGO)
An international "research-policy network that seeks to improve the status of the working poor – especially women – in the informal economy."

News Reports

Street Vendors drive Mexico’s Informal Economy
Report on NPR by Lourdes Garcia Navarro, Morning Edition, June 13, 2006.

Defending Workers’ Rights, Innovations by Informal Worker Movements (PDF)
UUA report on the UUSC Economic Justice program panel held at the Unitarian Universalist General Assembly, June 2006, St Louis, MO.

Street Vendors and Informal Trading: Struggling for the Right to Trade (PDF)
By Dr. Winnie Metullah, Pambazuka News 257, June 1, 2006.