US: Advocates Plan to Pressure Reynolds American over Tobacco Farm Working Conditions

Source from:  Winston-Salem Journal 05/08/2013

Supporters of the Farm Labor Organizing Committee want to see Thursday what kind of followup Reynolds American Inc. has to last year's pledge to address health and labor conditions on tobacco farms.

 Reynolds holds its annual shareholders meeting at 9 a.m. at its downtown Winston-Salem headquarters.
 
The advocacy group plans to hold a demonstration for the sixth consecutive year as part of putting pressure on Reynolds. Other recent efforts are focused on getting Reynolds vendor customers, such as 7-Eleven and Kangaroo Express, to raise issues of farm-labor conditions with Reynolds.

Advocates either buy Reynolds shares, or serve as proxies for shareholders, to express concerns during the shareholder comment period of the meeting. There is no formal shareholder proposal on farm labor on the agenda.

At the 2012 meeting, Daniel Delen, Reynolds' chief executive, pledged to meet with FLOC representatives and form a multilateral council that involves other tobacco manufacturers, growers, advocacy groups and labor officials.

The reasoning: Without having regulatory and enforcement officials at the table, there may be no effective oversight of the standards on which the groups agree, and no real legal consequences if growers don't adhere to the standards.

"We believe that Reynolds and FLOC can't address unilaterally these conditions because they are broader than each group," Delen said at the 2012 meeting. He talked about how his visit to a tobacco farm "certainly informed my opinion on the issue."

The pledge drew applause from many advocates, in large part because Reynolds tended in the past to not respond to protesters, saying the issues are the responsibilities of the farms.

According to the N.C. Growers Association, FLOC represents about 2,000 farm workers in North Carolina. FLOC has identified a number of problems at tobacco farms, including fatalities, sub-minimum wages, child labor, heat stroke, pesticide and nicotine poisoning, green tobacco sickness, and the lack of water and breaks during work.

Even though the council has met, there has been no public announcement of progress on the issues. Reynolds spokeswoman Jane Seccombe said the company will offer an update at the shareholders meeting.

In announcing this year's protest agenda, FLOC stated on its website: "Reynolds, talk is cheap! We want justice."

"Last year, Reynolds finally agreed to come to the table to talk with FLOC, but they have yet to sign an agreement guaranteeing the right to organize and collectively bargain for all farm workers in their supply chain," the group stated.

Baldemar Velasquez, FLOC's president, said after the 2012 shareholders meeting that he was pleased with Delen's willingness to meet with him. Velasquez could not be reached for comment Tuesday.

"In my years of negotiating with corporations, you have a sense when they are merely mouthing words and when there is traction behind the words," Velasquez said in May 2012. "I believe there is traction to moving the agenda forward."

In a statement FLOC released Tuesday, the group said Velasquez provided Reynolds with a proposal "which focuses on ensuring that human trafficking, squalid conditions in labor camps and fear that often keep workers silent in the face of abusive working conditions … do not exist on their contract farms."

Reynolds has taken the stance that since farm workers are employed by growers, and not the company, it doesn't play a direct negotiating role.

However, Reynolds has fleshed out steps it took in the past two years to address farm-worker conditions.

Reynolds hired an independent auditor to review 94 tobacco farms in North Carolina, which represent about one-third of those with which it has a contract in the state. UL Responsible Sourcing interviewed 254 farm workers as part of the audit.

The auditors said they found "that in general workers claim to be satisfied with their employment, and nearly all feel as though they are treated fairly by their employer." The auditors said "there is room for improvement" related to record-keeping, health and safety issues, and ways to file a complaint.

Velasquez encourages Reynolds to write its support of farm-worker rights into its corporate social responsibility policy, similar to what Philip Morris USA and British American Tobacco have done in recent years. Enditem