Global South

Sesame Street’s “Ernie Building Set” was released on July 15 in the United States and Europe, a product assembled in a sweatshop factory in Shenzhen, China by young exploited workers.

The New York Times has a piece on the killing of unionists in Colombia which is one of the factors getting in the way of U.S. President George W. Bush's attempt to push through a corporate-free trade agreement with Colombia. Among the dead this year are bank employee and union leader, Leonidas Gomez. (New York Times)

Update: April 4, 2008- The AP has another report today on the work stoppage and apparently some workers are pressing on with the strike.

Update: April 2, 2008- The Associated Press is reporting that the strike has ended but the factory remains closed due to a fight; facts on the ground remain unclear.

Vietnamese workers make 75 million pairs of shoes for Nike a year. Even though they produce for a flashy multinational corporation, the workers can't keep up with rising costs and make ends meet for their families.

21,000 workers have now walked off the job at the Ching Luh Vietnam Co. factory in southern Long An province, one of Nike's largest contractors. The workers are demanding a 20% pay increase to keep up with basic costs of living and improved working conditions.

Here is Nike's inadequate response to the strike:

"We recognize the impact that rising inflation has had on the people of Vietnam and support the government's move to raise the minimum wage at the beginning of the year. We strongly support the workers' right to freedom of association, and hope the situation will be resolved quickly and amicably."

Nike's public relations handlers are skillfully shirking responsibility for the inadequate pay the workers are receiving. Instead of employing the workers directly, Nike has chosen to hide behind a contractor. Then Nike can just point their finger at the labor dispute as if it were some innocent third-party. But Nike is by far the most powerful actor along the supply chain at issue. Nike effectively determines how much the workers earn by deciding how much it will pay for the shoes.

And Nike claims to support freedom of association but if the workers win more than Nike is comfortable with, it will just move production to another contractor. By moving business away from contractors with mobilized workforces, multinational retailers actually abrogate the right to freedom of association. (New York Times) (Wall Street Journal)

Local resistence has been spirited and will surely continue. (Wall Street Journal)

Journalist Christian Parenti has exposed the chocolate industry's voluntary labor standards- which it adoped to avoid real regulation- as a sham. Parenti traveled to the Ivory Coast and found children under ten working the fields. (Fortune)

Parenti squared off about his article in a televised debate with a representative of the chocolate multinationals. (Democracy Now!)