There are 40,000
flower workers in Ecuador and over 100,000 in Colombia,
working to grow, harvest, and package the roses and carnations sold in the United States.
More than half of them are women who commonly face labor rights violations
including sexual harassment, pesticide-related illnesses, and forced pregnancy
testing. Proceeds from the raffle will support the legal, health and safety,
and advocacy work done through ILRF's Fairness in Flowers Campaign.

First Sermon
Focused on Worker’s Rights

Despite the behavior in regards to
school teachers and unions, Pope Benedict did use his first Sunday sermon as the
newly ordained Pope to stress the importance of dignity, solidarity, and respect
for workers.

Here’s the excerpt from a story from
the Catholic News Service: http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/0502694.htm

As a union member, I would like to thank Savin and Didier for having the
strength to come here and share their experiences. Giving people a face to put
with the stories that we hear about is very important as we try to educate local
communities of the inhumane conditions workers face everyday in other countries
so that products are available here in the US. Cheap goods come at a high cost
somewhere down the line even if we don’t see it. Big corporations are reaping
huge profits at the expense of workers and consumers.

We stand with Savin and Didier, and others like them, to continue their
struggle to organize and fight for fair, safe, equitable, and humane working
conditions all around the globe.

Since the international campaign to stop Firestone's abusive of workers on their rubber plantation in Liberia began several years ago, Firestone has claimed that they do not hire children under the age of 18.  Meanwhile, they impose an unreasonably high production quota on workers which in order to be met requires them to bring their children and wives to work with them.  If they do not meet their quota, their low wages are halved.  If they do not receive their full wages, they will struggle to provide food for their families and many of the workers I spoke to told me that they have very little access to food already.  Since the children are not formal employees, Firestone is able to use word play to make it seem like their policies don't direc