For immediate release 3/12/07 Contact: Leila McDowell, 202-728-1829
WORKERS JOIN ENVIRONMENTALISTS TO TESTIFY AGAINST SMITHFIELD PACKING'S EFFORTS TO UP ITS SLAUGHTER RATE BY OVER ONE MILLION ADDITIONAL HOGS PER YEAR.
Hearing to be held before the North Carolina Environmental Management Commission
Thursday, March 15, 2007 at 7:00 p.m. Bladen County Community College 7418 NC Highway 41 West Dublin, North Carolina
Workers available for interviews, prior to the hearing
Smithfield Packing, the world's largest hog processing plant, is requesting an increase in production by 12 percent resulting in over a million more hogs being slaughtered annually. Critics charge that the company, already beset with a skyrocketing injury rate and labor shortages, will further harm dangerous safety and health conditions for workers. Environmentalists are concerned over possible damage to water from increased waste discharge, depletion of the state’s aquifer and growing open cesspools and sprayfields caused by the greater need for hogs.
Current employees will testify at the hearing that production is already being pushed to the limit with rapid line speeds, high turnover, poor training for workers and inadequate treatment for serious injuries. Former workers, several fired after being too injured to continue work, will reveal the deteriorated conditions under which workers are forced to labor.
Smithfield Packing is requesting the right to raise its slaughter rate to 9.5 million hogs per year from approximately 8.5 million. The hearing will allow state officials to hear first hand the dramatic effects this increase could have on North Carolina workers and residents.
In a recent report "Packaged with Abuse: Safety and Health Conditions at Smithfield Packing's Tar Heel Plant", Research Associates of America examined safety and health conditions of injuries there over the course of three years. According to OSHA data, injuries including punctures, lacerations, fractures, amputations and chemical burns, have increased 200 percent since 2003, much of it due to the rapid line speed.
It's also likely that the real number of injuries is higher than that which is reported. Workers disclosed patterns of intimidation and fear that have dissuaded them from reporting their injuries, or cases in which they were simply not permitted to go to the plant clinic when an injury occurred. The increase in production is only expected to exacerbate the growing injury rate.
For information and interviews with workers, contact Leila McDowell 202 728 1829.
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The Council of Churches of Greater Washington, a coalition of 75 area churches, passed a resolution condemning Smithfield Foods for creating an environment of intimidation and fear for workers and encourages its congregants to take direct action by not purchasing Smithfield products and contacting the company. Click for a copy of the resolution in html or as a pdf.
DC City Council introduces resolution condemning Smithfield Foods for creating an environment of intimidation and fear for workers and encourages all supermarkets and vendors in DC from stocking Smithfield meat products. Click for a copy of the resolution in html or as a pdf.
The August '08 issue of Business North Carolina features a cover story on the Justice@Smithfield campaign. Read the article in html or as a pdf.
New York Times columnist Adam Liptak discusses the lawsuit against Justice@Smithfield and the First Amendment. Read the column.
Fayetteville Observer: "Ruling forbids Smithfield Packing using threats"
The March '08 cover story in Labor Notes asks, "Is Fighting for Justice at Smithfield Racketeering?"
Smithifield's Tar Heel workers win a paid Martin Luther King Holiday. Read the press release.
Avram Lyon says when he sees Paula Deen on TV, "all I can think of are the people working under horrible conditions at Smithfield." Read his article in the Forward.
Breast Cancer foundation sues Smithfield Foods for trademark violation.
Read Justice@Smithifield's statement on the U.S. Court of Appeals 4th Circuit court ruling on Smithfield.
The final quarter of Paula Deen's hour-long appearence on NPR's Diane Rehm Show Nov. 28 was dominated by questions over her association with Smithfield Foods. Listen to the show using Windows Media Viewer or Real Player.
On Thursday, November 8, 2007, activists with the Western Massachusetts Jobs With Justice organized a protest outside a brand new Big Y supermarket in Northampton. Read More.
On September 12, the Bergen County (NJ) Central Trades and Labor Council passed a resolution calling on Smithfield to "[o]bey the law, by providing a safe workplace, giving Smithfield workers the right to chose a union...free from interferene of any kind."
On August 6, Smithfield Tar Heel plant worker Jose Ozorio Figueroa was terminated. Company representatives claim it was for showing up four minutes late to his shift, but Ozorio believes that he was fired for his union activities. Read his statement.
Presidential Master Chef Talli V. Counsel asks celebrity chef Paula Deen to use her influence to end the “brutal working conditions” at Smithfield’s Tar Heel Plant. Read more.
On August 1, 2007, the City of Boston passed a resolution calling on the city to "review its purchasing of any products from the Smithfield Packing Company in Tar Heel, North Carolina....and suspend these purchases until the company ends all form of abuse, inimidation and violence against its workers..." It also encourages Boston supermarkets "to consider suspending their purchase of any Smithfield products..."
On Saturday, July 14, dozens of Nashville clergy, civil rights leaders and consumers rallied to demand that two area supermarkets to stop stocking Smithfield Foods pork products made at the company’s Tar Heel plant. Read more.
More than 100 supporters rallied in front of a Publix supermarket in Atlanta to demand that the market stop carrying pork products from Smithfield's Tar Heel plant. Read More.
More than 250 family members and supporters of Smithfield Workers delivered a Father’s Day Card to Harris Teeter’s president. Read the news coverage [With Video].
On June 4, the City of Cambridge, MA unanimously passed a resolution in support Smithfield workers in Tar Heel. Read the historic resolution.
Children of Smithfield workers will deliver a Father's Day card to Harris Teeter's PresidentDownload the flyer.
Jim Hightower: Paula Deen "has cooked up a big ol' mess of political controversy for herself." Read the story.
