How could an ad celebrating the American farmer paint such a distorted picture of the people who actually work on farms today? The reality is that farmworkers are systematically underpaid and under-appreciated.

2012 was an up and down and altogether historic year for the food movement. In order to succeed in 2013, the movement needs to incorporate more voices from throughout the food chain and think creatively about how to unite across traditional boundaries.

The physical conditions in the tomato fields were extreme. No shade, oppressively hot, with workers running with many pounds of tomatoes on their shoulders. I stood there fully aware that these workers are routinely exploited and sometimes physically enslaved. I had seen the overcrowded worker housing.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers, the remarkable farmworker organization in Florida that I have written about many times over the years as they continue to win victory after victory in their Campaign for Fair Food, has done it again.

Like any family, the families who own and run Publix gather around their holiday tables and reflect on their joys and struggles. Among those joys, year after year, are soaring profits. Yet they inexplicably continue to turn their backs on the farmworkers who make those profits possible.

For too long, the industry responded to accusations of farm labor abuse with denial and opposition. But today there exists a better way forward embraced by the vast majority of Florida growers.

The Fair Food program is pretty simple: When these retailers and restaurants pay one penny more for a pound of tomatoes, workers wages increase dramatically.

Fifty people will begin a “Fast for Fair Food” next month outside the Publix headquarters in Lakeland, it was announced this week in Brandon. H...

Taco Bell has agreed to join the plight for farm workers, as have 9 other major corporations including McDonald's, Subway, Burger King, and Whole Foods. But guess who wont: Chipotle and Trader Joe's.