North Carolina-based specialty food store The Fresh Market is the most recent partner to sign up to the Coalition of Immokalee Workers' (CIW) Fair Food program (FFP), signaling support for verifiable, worker-driven social responsibility in U.S. agriculture.

In a release, the CIW said the store would start increasing its purchases 15% year-on-year from Florida tomato growers participating in the program, starting with the 2015-16 season.

The coalition described the partnership as setting an important new precedent that recognizes growers who are making significant investments to improve labor conditions.

Additionally, The Fresh Market will make an annual contribution to support the Fair Food Standards Council (FFSC), a third-party monitoring organization that oversees compliance with the Fair Food Program’s unique human rights standards.

"We are pleased to enter into this partnership with the Coalition of Immokalee Workers and to be a part of the Fair Food Program," said Lee Arthur, the store's merchandising vice president - produce, floral and gift center.

"We continuously look for ways to source the best products, and being a part of the FFP helps us to know we are sourcing from growers whose practices are fair and socially responsible. This allows us to provide our customers with food they can feel good about purchasing and enjoy sharing with friends and family."

The CIW's Guadalupe Gonzalo said the agreement truly took the program to a "new level".

"The FFP is pioneering a new form of social responsibility, one in which we as workers ourselves take a leading role in protecting our own rights in the fields," Gonzalo said.

"But we can’t do this alone. The FFP is a day-to-day, careful partnership with growers and buyers alike aimed at ensuring that the workplace environment in Florida's fields is second to none.

"We have achieved that goal. And now, with this agreement and its new provisions in support of participating growers and the Fair Food Standards Council – two elements essential to the Program's success — we have laid the groundwork to sustain and scale up those gains well into the future."

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