Sep. 12, 2009 (PR Newswire) --
OAKLAND, Calif., Sept. 12 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- Today the Teamsters protested at the "Entrepreneur's Open Forum" at the Numi Tea Garden to highlight Whole Food's hypocrisy of claiming to support sustainable policies while its CEO lobbies against real health reform for its workers and customers. Executives from Whole Foods and its leading supplier United Natural Foods, Inc. (Nasdaq: UNFI) led discussions on "strategies for healthy business growth."
The Whole Foods CEO, in a Wall Street Journal op-ed, attacked President Obama's efforts to reform America's ailing health care system. Whole Foods believes that Americans have no right to health care and that health care should be an individual responsibility. That's easy for its CEO, who can afford expensive private health insurance, to say.
The Teamsters believe it is shameful for Whole Foods to seek to shift the health care burden even further onto individuals and to call for less government help in solving America's health care crisis.
"Whole Foods' CEO is talking out of both sides of his mouth when it comes to enacting real change in health reform," said Teamsters General President James P. Hoffa. "We can't allow corporate agendas to stop us from making health care affordable for everyone."
The Teamsters call upon Whole Foods, and its principal supplier UNFI, to promote a sustainable organic food supply chain and sustainable jobs, and support our President's efforts for a sustainable health care system for America.
The International Brotherhood of Teamsters was founded in 1903 and represents 1.4 million hardworking men and women in the United States, Canada and Puerto Rico.
SOURCE International Brotherhood of Teamsters
