A Florida-based group supporting farm workers' rights brought its fight to central Ohio this weekend.

The Coalition of Immokalee Workers has been trying for years, without success, to add Wendy's to the list of giant food companies that have adopted its set of worker-protection standards. On Friday, farm workers and supporters from around the country rallied outside the company's Dublin headquarters.

By Sunday, busloads of college students, union members and other supporters converged on Columbus from points around the country to stage a march from Goodale Park to the southern edge of the Ohio State University campus.

>> Video | Marchers arrive at Ohio State

About 250 of them gathered at the southeastern corner of Goodale Park, carrying signs demanding justice for farm workers and calling on people to boycott Wendy's until it signed the pledge. They chanted "The people united will never be defeated. Boycott Wendy's."

They rallied despite a shower that eventually grew into a downpour as they prepared to march from the park to campus.

The activists, all part of a 12-city national tour, came to Columbus to confront Wendy's and to support 19 Ohio State students and recent graduates who spent the week fasting in support of the cause, said Leonel Perez, a Florida farm worker and coalition member.

The fasting students want Ohio State to terminate a lease under which Wendy's operates a restaurant in Doan Hall. "It's not a light thing to do to our bodies," said Rachel Metzler, a 2016 graduate who joined the fast. She said protesting via fast has played an important role in the movement for farm workers' rights. The students, along with Perez and other activists, met with OSU Chief Financial Officer Geoff Chatas and other university officials on Friday.

"A food company that doesn't respect basic human rights for farm workers is an unethical choice for our university," said Henry Anton Peller, a doctoral student studying soil science who was among the students fasting.

The university's lease with Wendy's stipulates that the company must address the farm workers' concerns about sourcing of tomatoes in a way "that is satisfactory to (the university) in its sole discretion." Metzler and the other protesters maintain that adopting the coalition's Fair Food Program is the only way to satisfy their concerns; Wendy's has been unwilling to do that.

Food companies that sign on to the coalition's program pledge to buy only from farms that also have committed to its rules. Those rules require the farms to submit to inspections by a third party to ensure that workers are treated fairly, protected from sexual abuse and human trafficking and allowed to talk to coalition members on company time about their rights.

A number of major food companies, including Burger King, McDonald's, Yum Brands (Taco Bell), Whole Foods, Trader Joe's and Wal-Mart have signed on. The program has been lauded by the United Nations, an advisory council to President Barack Obama, The Washington Post, The New York Times and PBS.

Participating food companies also agree to pay participating farms an extra penny per pound of tomatoes, and that's where much of the dispute with Wendy's lies. Wendy's considers the extra penny to be a fee paid to the coalition, spokeswoman Heidi Schauer said in an email.

The coalition says that it sees none of the extra money, and most goes to workers and is accounted for separately on their paychecks. Growers keep 13 percent to cover their higher payroll taxes.

A post on a Wendy's company blog also explains the disagreement thus: "...we don’t believe we should pay another company’s employees — just as we do not pay factory workers, truck drivers or maintenance personnel that work for our other suppliers." Coalition members say that the provision has increased farm workers' pay by $23 million since the program was founded in 2011.

Wendy's also contends that its own code of conduct for suppliers ensures fair treatment of workers. The coalition maintains that the Wendy's code is vague and not enforced by a third party. Under the Fair Food Program, complaints about violations are taken to the Fair Food Standards Council, a board that was set up originally by the coalition and now is self-governing, choosing its own members.

The council's executive director, retired New York State Supreme Court Judge Laura Safer Espinoza, says the council has resolved more than 1,600 complaints.

mcedward@dispatch.com

@MaryMoganEdward