2016 #DocImpact Graffiti art by Victor Ving CELEBRATING THE DOCUMENTARY FILMS THAT HAVE MADE THE GREATEST IMPACT ON SOCIETY 7 Impact Award 2016 Welcome 8 The Doc Impact Award 2016 is presented by: Welcome Impact Award Impact Award HOT DANG We are so proud to share with you the story of the five remarkable winners of the Doc Impact Award 2016. To qualify for the Doc Impact Award, excellence in filmmaking is not enough. Doc Impact Award films must also have created significant and measurable social impact. Since 2011 this annual prize has been celebrating the power of film as a driver of change. Our aim: —To help build new fans for the films —Create new partners for the campaigns —To share best practice for the whole community Read on to learn about the campaign strategy & impact achievements for Food Chains. To read all five case studies and see previous winners go to www.docimpactaward.org and follow the conversation online at #docimpact 9 Food Chains The Film 10 Food Chains Food Backing the farmworkers WINNER: taking on the food super chains. FOOD CHAINS 11 Food Chains The Film 12 Critical Acclaim “ However you look at it, “Food Chains” Food Chains Food FOOD CHAINS is a mouthful. Gathering at least The Film three films under Food Chains is an exposé, following an one rousing umbrella intrepid group of Florida farmworkers — the fair-wage as they battle to defeat the $4 trillion struggle of tomato global supermarket industry through pickers in Florida their ingenious Fair Food program, which — this emphatic partners with growers and retailers to and empathetic improve working conditions for farm documentary laborers in the United States. presents the plight Food Chains reveals the human cost in our food supply and of our farm laborers the complicity of large buyers of produce like fast food chains as modern-day and supermarkets. Fast food is big, but supermarkets are bigger – earning $4 trillion globally. They have tremendous power over slavery. It’s very the agricultural system. Over the past three decades they have hard to disagree.” drained revenue from their supply chain leaving farmworkers — in poverty and forced to work under subhuman conditions. Jeannette Catsoulis NY Times The narrative of the film focuses on an intrepid and highly lauded group of tomato pickers from Southern Florida—the Coalition of Immokalee Workers or CIW—and their campaign against Publix, a Floridian supermarket chain that is one of the JAMES BEARD AWARD: largest in the world. The film follows the CIW as they undergo FOOD MEDIA CATEGORY a grueling six-day fast in the hope of beginning a dialogue with 2015 the executives of the retail giant. The CIW are bringing to Publix a proven method for stopping wage theft, sexual harassment and modern-day slavery in the fields. Their story is one of hope PVBLIC FOUNDATION and promise for the triumph of morality over corporate greed SOCIAL IMPACT AWARD – to ensure a dignified life for farmworkers and a more humane, 2014 transparent food chain. 13 Food Chains The Campaign 14 The Campaign The THE CAMPAIGN 15 Food Chains The Campaign 16 Between 1995 and 2000, the CIW million dollars annually for the ensure that the film would serve CONTEXT organized several major actions to community in increased wages). as a focal point and inspiration protest declining real wages for Those raises brought the tomato to farmworkers outside of tomato harvesters, as well as picking piece rate back to pre- Immokalee, Florida. Through The history of exploitation in farm work frequent violence from 1980 levels (the piece rate had extensive grassroots organizing The Campaign The in the United States dates back to slavery. supervisors towards field workers. fallen below those levels over and action, the campaign aligned This period included community- the course of the intervening with CIW’s ongoing movement wide work stoppages in 1995, two decades), but wages to pressure industry powerhouses While groups like the UFW (United Farm 1997 and 1999; a 30-day hunger remained below poverty level such as the Publix and Stop and Workers) achieved historic successes for strike undertaken by six members and continuing improvement Shop supermarket chains and the in 1998; and a 230-mile march was slow in coming.” fast food giant Wendy’s to adopt farmworker justice, farm labor today remains from Ft. Myers to Orlando in the Fair Food Program, an one of the most difficult and most underpaid 2000. By 1998, these protests The Food Chains campaign innovative system to monitor “won industry-wide raises of strategy was developed in and enforce humane conditions jobs in America. Farmworkers are generally 13-25% (translating into several partnership with the CIW to in Florida’s tomato industry. paid by the piece rather than strictly by the hour, a system that is a direct legacy of slavery. Forced to work at a brutal pace in order to earn the equivalent of minimum wage, farmworkers live well below the poverty line. An average farmworker earns about $12,000 a year providing the goods that enable large retailers to make billions in annual profits. In the most extreme cases, of the state’s $600 million farmworkers have been held tomato industry. The group’s in debt bondage or modern- organizing philosophy is based day slavery. These are not rare on principles of popular education occurrences, but rather, a by- and leadership development. product of an agricultural One of the CIW’s first system that relies on the accomplishments was to establish desperately poor. a cooperative to sell staple foods and other necessities at cost in The CIW was formed in 1993 in order to combat price gouging Immokalee, Florida, the epicenter by local merchants. 17 Food Chains The Campaign 18 Pre-Release Strategies on social media to bring mass vanden Heuvel, Editor of The THE CAMPAIGN During production of the film, awareness to the Fair Food Nation to host a screening. several high profile executive Program. One month before Human rights activist Kerry producers came on board, the film’s release, the campaign Kennedy hosted a screening notably actress Eva Longoria hosted a Food Day (October, at the NY Times Headquarters. The Campaign The and author Eric Schlosser. The 2014) Twitter Chat, which team worked with Longoria to reached one million people In addition, CIW worked with leverage her ‘public pulpit’ to within an hour. Food Chain’s the film’s team to organize motivate supermarket and fast co-producer Barry Estabrook, farmworker screenings. After a food chain non-signatories to was the most retweeted series of screenings, resources sign onto the Fair Food Program. individual, reaching 658,000 were secured to dub the film people. In the ensuing weeks, into Spanish to make the film The campaign also leveraged the Executive Producer, Eva accessible for a larger proportion resources of the CIW to promote Longoria, and her 7 million of the workforce. the film while in production and followers were a Twitter force, as build excitement within their were Forest Whitaker, Thandie Post-Release Strategies network through constant Newton, Michael Pollan and Alice To energize existing activists and production updates on their Waters. Simultaneous to the reach potential new activists, the website and social media. By Food Day Twitter Chat, a filmmakers secured a nationwide the time the film was released, Thunderclap was released, theatrical distribution deal to How the Rather than attempting to reach a strategic screening strategy was simultaneously reaching 731k place the film in most of the top Campaign Worked a broad audience as a means in place that served to mobilize people. Working with CIW and 20 US markets. To maximize the Supporting the work of the to mass mobilization, the and expand the CIW base. additional partners, there were November 2014 premiere, the CIW, the Food Chains impact campaign adopted the CIW’s 63 million Twitter impressions film was released day and date campaign targeted those theory of change, creating the The campaign used the before the theatrical release. on iTunes with a launch on Cable ultimately responsible for the perception of a larger movement; theatrical premiere as a spark VOD shortly thereafter. In 2015, low wages and poor working The campaign’s goal was to work Netflix began streaming the film, conditions of farmworkers. with CIW to recruit 5,000 “ Food Chains is Eva Longoria allowing community and labor The campaign developed strong motivated viewers and then @evalongoria activists to view Food Chains partnerships that resulted in marshall them into pressuring viscerally moving, I’m sooooo proud of this with ease. extensive grassroots organizing. supermarkets to adopt the Fair it shows a true lens documentary! #FoodChains Protests, use of high profile Food Program. Using screenings Targeting youth was essential to celebrity media events, key as a focal point for activism, into the lives of the the campaign’s goal of creating influencer/legislative screenings audiences (key influencers and very people who The campaign strategically held new Fair Food activists. Working and social media all contributed activists) were challenged to do pick our food.” influencer screenings prior to the with the CIW, the film was to successfully promoting the what was in their realm of — release of Food Chains to mobilize screened in colleges and Fair Food program, which was influence (from policy to protest) Venerated chef and support. In NYC, the campaign universities across Florida and ultimately adopted by large to change the way farmworkers farm-to-table pioneer, focused on the progressive media surrounding states. Additionally, corporations, such as Wal-Mart. are treated across the US. Alice Waters community and engaged Katrina screenings at conferences like 19 Food Chains The Campaign 20 the politically progressive Food Chains NetRoots Nation served to build @FoodChainsFilm the volunteer base for CIW.