150 Picket Sunkist, Say Women Get Unequal Pay
About 150 demonstrators picketed the headquarters of Sunkist Growers Inc. in Sherman Oaks Saturday to protest what they called unfair labor practices at two Sunkist-affiliated lemon packing plants in Oxnard.
Chanting “Sunkist lemons, unfair to women,” the demonstrators formally launched a nationwide boycott of Sunkist lemons, said Rosemarie Pegueros-Lev, a spokeswoman for California National Organization for Women, which sponsored the protest.
Pegueros-Lev said NOW chapters throughout the nation are backing members of the Fresh Fruit & Vegetables Workers, Local 78-A, who voted to stage a Sunkist lemon boycott after contract negotiations with the Seaboard Lemon Assn. broke down in May. The association operates two of 60 California and Arizona packinghouses that are affiliated with Sunkist.
Women Allegedly Earn Less
Protest organizers alleged that Seaboard, which employs about 200 workers, pays women employees half what it pays its male workers.
Executives of Seaboard were not available for comment Saturday. But Leon L. Gordon, an attorney who represents an agricultural trade association of which Seaboard is a member, said that the company denies it discriminates against women.
“Any differences in salary can be explained in different types of work being done at the plant, “ said Gordon, who is general counsel for Valencia-based Agricultural Products. “But to say that men are paid twice as much as women across the board is not true.”
Sunkist, a nonprofit marketing cooperative of citrus growers that employs about 400 workers at its national headquarters, markets all lemons packed by Seaboard, a group of 82 growers. However, Sunkist maintains no managerial control over Seaboard or its other member packing plants, a Sunkist spokeswoman said.
“Our job is to market the products of our members,” spokeswoman Anne Warring said. “We don’t own any packinghouses, and therefore we cannot practice labor relations of any kind.”
Pegueros-Lev acknowledged that Sunkist has no jurisdiction over employee hiring and salaries at Seaboard, but said that Sunkist could exert influence over Seaboard.
“If Sunkist were to say it wouldn’t accept lemons from the plant, then Seaboard would have to change their practices,” she said.
Pegueros-Lev said that other demonstrations will be held throughout the United States at retail outlets that sell Sunkist lemons. “We hope that we can hurt Sunkist enough in the pocketbook so that they will convince Seaboard to change,” she said.
