Khmer Times/Safiya Charles Wednesday, 05 October 2016
US International Labor Affairs special representative Sarah Fox yesterday expressed concern over an alarming spate of foreign factory owners fleeing the country and shirking their financial obligations, leaving thousands of their mostly female workforce – who often live paycheck to paycheck – without wages.
Arriving in Cambodia on the heels of the second Stakeholder’s Forum on Labor Law Reform in Myanmar, Ms. Fox said yesterday that she met with labor organizations engaged with trade unions in Cambodia that were attempting to “map” the activities and whereabouts of fugitive factory owners – whether they had indeed left the country or were operating in a different location under a new name.
Admitting that the US government had no “prescribed solution” for how to deal with the problem – most notably a lack of effort to track down owners of defunct factories that may have supplied to American companies or could still be conducting business in the US – the State Department official suggested a system of protection to ensure workers were not left reeling in the aftermath.
Using the example of unemployment insurance to illustrate how a plan could work, she said it might require factories and employees to pay into a fund that workers would be entitled to in the event of an unexpected closure or loss of employment.
“All of these issues create questions about the systems that a country has to help workers who lose their jobs...[they] raise questions for the government of Cambodia about whether there is a better way to help ensure that it’s not workers who are left with the pain when a factory closes,” she said.
Labor unions and civil society organizations have been calling for government officials to address the now rampant problem for years and say they have been met continually with indifference.
Many have suggested the administration require factories operating within the country leave a substantial “security” deposit in a Cambodian bank in the event of factory delinquency.
“The government must demand that employers deposit money in the National Bank so that if they escape or shut down the factory, we can take the money and pay workers,” Pav Sina, the president of the Collective Union of Movement of Workers, told Khmer Times in August.
“We would do that so as to not allow them to run away without taking any responsibility for their actions.”
After the passing of the controversial Trade Union Law in April, the International Labor Organization (ILO) – which acted as an advisor in assembling the legislation – drafted a statement to the Labor Ministry highlighting key areas that warranted additional consideration.
Included were concerns over age, residency and literacy requirements mandated for union leaders and an overwhelming 50 percent plus one majority among union members to enact a strike.
With more than 3,000 unions for more than 600 factories spread across various provinces, some consisting of 100,000 members, it would make it extremely difficult, perhaps even impossible, for some unions to achieve a majority.
Ms. Fox has continually reiterated the need for collective bargaining to ensure the needs of the government, garment associations and labor unions were met.
“The collective bargaining process can take into account the varying interests of the parties...so that conflict – which you see manifesting itself here in Cambodia through strikes – [with] a more mature collective bargaining system [has] more of a channel through which the issues over which workers are striking can be dealt with through the mediation and conciliation process.
“What we’re interested in promoting is inclusive growth and that is growth in which the benefits don’t only go to the few but they’re broadly shared, where people feel they’re not marginalized in the economy, where they can participate actively and productively.”
The garment sector is one of the country’s largest industries, employing 700,000 workers and accounting for roughly 80 percent of Cambodia’s total export revenue and 26 percent of its GDP. It is also the single largest employer of women.
Of those 700,000 garment workers, 500,000 are female. Often migrating from provincial towns to earn factory wages, most have no more than a primary school education and remain vulnerable to health risks, abuse from employers and unsafe working conditions among other things.
Despite the Labor Advisory Committee’s (LAC) recent minimum wage hike bringing the total monthly salary up from $140 to $153 – almost $20 short of the unions’ proposed increase – Cambodian women still earn 35 percent less than their male counterparts, according to a 2016 ILO survey.
But Ms. Fox said the onus for higher wages – and subsequent price rises – was not on the US government or companies buying from suppliers in countries like Cambodia, but on consumers, who she claimed were well aware of the conditions under which their products are being made.
“There is a lot of consumer consciousness about the conditions under which garments are made, more interest by the public in wanting to feel the clothes they’re buying aren’t the product of exploitation of workers in other countries.
“US and European garment brands want to be able to tell consumers that they source from countries where worker rights are being respected,” she said.
“There obviously is a relationship between better labor wages and prices. If the consumers are saying this is what we want then brands will be willing to pay a higher price for getting that, if that’s what it costs to be able to. I think consumers play a big role in all of this.”
A 2015 survey by GT Nexus found that 45 percent of consumers would pay more for responsibly-produced clothing and footwear, but only 30 percent of consumers said they would pay up to five percent more for clothing responsibly produced, and only if it was made in the US.
US International Labor Affairs special representative Sarah Fox yesterday expressed concern over an alarming spate of foreign factory owners fleeing the country and shirking their financial obligations, leaving thousands of their mostly female workforce – who often live paycheck to paycheck – without wages.
Arriving in Cambodia on the heels of the second Stakeholder’s Forum on Labor Law Reform in Myanmar, Ms. Fox said yesterday that she met with labor organizations engaged with trade unions in Cambodia that were attempting to “map” the activities and whereabouts of fugitive factory owners – whether they had indeed left the country or were operating in a different location under a new name.
Admitting that the US government had no “prescribed solution” for how to deal with the problem – most notably a lack of effort to track down owners of defunct factories that may have supplied to American companies or could still be conducting business in the US – the State Department official suggested a system of protection to ensure workers were not left reeling in the aftermath.
Using the example of unemployment insurance to illustrate how a plan could work, she said it might require factories and employees to pay into a fund that workers would be entitled to in the event of an unexpected closure or loss of employment.
“All of these issues create questions about the systems that a country has to help workers who lose their jobs...[they] raise questions for the government of Cambodia about whether there is a better way to help ensure that it’s not workers who are left with the pain when a factory closes,” she said.
Labor unions and civil society organizations have been calling for government officials to address the now rampant problem for years and say they have been met continually with indifference.
Many have suggested the administration require factories operating within the country leave a substantial “security” deposit in a Cambodian bank in the event of factory delinquency.
“The government must demand that employers deposit money in the National Bank so that if they escape or shut down the factory, we can take the money and pay workers,” Pav Sina, the president of the Collective Union of Movement of Workers, told Khmer Times in August.
“We would do that so as to not allow them to run away without taking any responsibility for their actions.”
After the passing of the controversial Trade Union Law in April, the International Labor Organization (ILO) – which acted as an advisor in assembling the legislation – drafted a statement to the Labor Ministry highlighting key areas that warranted additional consideration.
Included were concerns over age, residency and literacy requirements mandated for union leaders and an overwhelming 50 percent plus one majority among union members to enact a strike.
With more than 3,000 unions for more than 600 factories spread across various provinces, some consisting of 100,000 members, it would make it extremely difficult, perhaps even impossible, for some unions to achieve a majority.
Ms. Fox has continually reiterated the need for collective bargaining to ensure the needs of the government, garment associations and labor unions were met.
“The collective bargaining process can take into account the varying interests of the parties...so that conflict – which you see manifesting itself here in Cambodia through strikes – [with] a more mature collective bargaining system [has] more of a channel through which the issues over which workers are striking can be dealt with through the mediation and conciliation process.
“What we’re interested in promoting is inclusive growth and that is growth in which the benefits don’t only go to the few but they’re broadly shared, where people feel they’re not marginalized in the economy, where they can participate actively and productively.”
The garment sector is one of the country’s largest industries, employing 700,000 workers and accounting for roughly 80 percent of Cambodia’s total export revenue and 26 percent of its GDP. It is also the single largest employer of women.
Of those 700,000 garment workers, 500,000 are female. Often migrating from provincial towns to earn factory wages, most have no more than a primary school education and remain vulnerable to health risks, abuse from employers and unsafe working conditions among other things.
Despite the Labor Advisory Committee’s (LAC) recent minimum wage hike bringing the total monthly salary up from $140 to $153 – almost $20 short of the unions’ proposed increase – Cambodian women still earn 35 percent less than their male counterparts, according to a 2016 ILO survey.
But Ms. Fox said the onus for higher wages – and subsequent price rises – was not on the US government or companies buying from suppliers in countries like Cambodia, but on consumers, who she claimed were well aware of the conditions under which their products are being made.
“There is a lot of consumer consciousness about the conditions under which garments are made, more interest by the public in wanting to feel the clothes they’re buying aren’t the product of exploitation of workers in other countries.
“US and European garment brands want to be able to tell consumers that they source from countries where worker rights are being respected,” she said.
“There obviously is a relationship between better labor wages and prices. If the consumers are saying this is what we want then brands will be willing to pay a higher price for getting that, if that’s what it costs to be able to. I think consumers play a big role in all of this.”
A 2015 survey by GT Nexus found that 45 percent of consumers would pay more for responsibly-produced clothing and footwear, but only 30 percent of consumers said they would pay up to five percent more for clothing responsibly produced, and only if it was made in the US.