Labor agreement ends Mt. Olive pickle boycott

Five-year effort successfully concluded

by Jerry L. Van Marter

LOUISVILLE — A five-year boycott of the Mt. Olive Pickle Company in North Carolina — which was led by the National Council of Churches and supported by the Presbyterian Church (USA) — came to an end this week with the signing of an agreement between the Farm Labor Organizing Committee and the North Carolina Growers Association (NCGA).

      The collective bargaining agreement, signed Sept. 16, covers 1,000 growers in North Carolina and an estimated 8,500 legal (federal “H-2A”) guest migrant workers from Mexico and other Latin American countries who work on North Carolina farms each year.

      “This agreement gives these farm workers in North Carolina the justice they deserve,” said NCC General Secretary Bob Edgar, who traveled to Raleigh, NC, for the signing of the agreement.

      “NCGA initiated discussions with the union because it saw an opportunity to strengthen its H-2A program in North Carolina,” said Mt. Olive spokesperson Lynn Williams.

      In settling the boycott, Mt. Olive agreed to:

• expand its code of corporate conduct for North Carolina growers and suppliers;
• increase cucumber prices paid to North Carolina and Ohio suppliers by 2.25 percent annually for the next three years; and
• provide a 3 percent annual supplement to growers who provide Workers Compensation insurance coverage to their farm workers.

      Mt. Olive had previously refused to negotiate with the union on the grounds that its suppliers were not employees and so the company could not get involved with labor disputes. The same reasoning has been used by Taco Bell in refusing to broker labor agreements with tomato pickers in Immokalee, FL, where another PC(USA)-supported boycott is ongoing.