Gemaakt (responsibly?) In China
Door Katherine Don
Ik had onlangs de kans om twee fabrieken in de zuidelijke stad van China van Kaiping te bezoeken die denimjeans voor een belangrijke kortingsdetailhandelaar in de Verenigde Staten produceerde. Van mening zijnd dat de enige rapporten van Chinese textielfabrieken dat ik was gekomen over kritiek waren geweest, was het bezoek een (prettige) verrassing.
Het werk voorwaarden waren ordelijk en proper, was de lucht koel ondanks het schroeien van hitte enkel voorbij de concrete muren, stroomde de grootmoedige verlichting van grote baaivensters, en de gezonde werknemers babbelden terloops boven het gezoem van de machines nauwelijks opmerkend de aanwezigheid van de fabriekseigenaar die ons door leidt. Een betekenis van eerbied en camaraderie ging tussen het beheer en de werknemers, leeftijden 20-40 over, terwijl de atmosfeer voor een Zondag middag zonder een betekenis van werknemersuitputting of onderdrukking kalm maar toch efficiënt was.
Elke vloer van de grote faciliteit bezette een verschillend stadium van het productieproces, van knipsel aan het naaien, het borduren, en verpakking. De vloeren werden keurig georganiseerd met stevig machine-wat automatiseren-voor een gestroomlijnd proces van bout aan doos.
Terwijl het waarnemen van het mechanische, nog ijverige proces bij elke post, die uit tussen hopen van denim Jean in diverse stadia wordt uitgespreid, was het natuurlijk om te zien hoe meer dan 4000 punten dagelijks klaar voor de planken van een belangrijke Amerikaanse grote doosopslag worden veroorzaakt, die met hangers en prijs markering-helemaal voor minder dan 25 centen per het stuk-huidige gaande tarief voor gesneden om het even welk, stijl, was en hoeveelheid denimjeans worden voorverpakt in China. Considering the ability of the factory to quickly program and mass produce any cut and style, the notion of a boutique jeans market in the west seemed a laughable scam on the upper-class western consumer. (I was especially impressed by the custom embroidery machine pictured below, which stitched the butterflies and curlicues you see on teenage girls’ hip-hugger back pockets, 16 at a time)
One of the more altruistic in our party spoke with the owner about increasing worker salaries and benefits in order to reverse the much-publicized “race to the bottom” of the globalized textile industry. The owner’s response demonstrated the real-world complexities of a decision that is so obvious in the eyes of western academics and journalists. Like the U.S. there is tremendous job insecurity in China. Though China makes as much as half the world’s clothes today, perpetual fear exists that less-developed markets like Vietnam, Bangladesh and Thailand will take the reins as soon as China loses its competitive edge. This fear is so much the case, that any attempts by factory owners to rock the boat have been met with threats and violence from other factory owners, fearful of losing their businesses.
Not surprisingly, the factory owner said that it was not just his workers who feel the squeeze; he himself is left with very little salary at the end of the day and the middlemen at later stages of the supply chain that eat up all of the margins.
Regardless of the veracity of the factory owner’s stories, what was immediately evident was that the stories of workers locked into dark rooms—not allowed to take bathroom breaks or talk, being worked to the brink of death—were not the case in this factory. In retrospect, it seems sheltered and naive to assume that the conditions of every factory in China are dismal chambers where laborers are enslaved in poor working conditions under management insensitive to personal health and well-being.
Inevitably it has been the reports of flawed practice and mismanagement that tend to make headlines while presumably thousands of factories, like the one I saw, prosper under relatively fair-minded and responsible business owners.
Katherine Don, reader-contribution on Managing the Dragon
December 9th, 2007 at 4:25 pm
“Monitoring contract manufacturers from abroad is not easy. Visits to factories are hard to arrange, are often canceled, and, when they do occur, are sometimes elaborately stage-managed.” - Economist 8/16/07
From a single visit to an apparently socially-responsible factory the author draws sweeping conclusions. She presumes that “thousands of factories, like the one I saw, prosper under relatively fair-minded and responsible business owners,” and argues that it is “naive to assume that the conditions of every factory in China are dismal chambers where laborers are enslaved in poor working conditions under management insensitive to personal health and well-being.”
But what does it mean if thousands of factories are socially responsible while a possibly equal number, or more, are indeed “dismal chambers where laborers are enslaved in poor working conditions”? There is no reason to assume the factory Katherine Don visited is representative of the majority of factories in China. And while sweatshops may not be the norm in China, there are certainly far too many of them.
The Western press is right to expose unfair working conditions in China’s factories. Based on Ms. Don’s snapshot of the factory she visited, the working conditions she observed are to be expected, just as policemen are expected not to be corrupt and chemical plants are expected not to dump toxic waste into the local reservoir.
This reminds me of the foreigner who goes to China, visits Beijing and Shanghai, and comes away with the impression that China is developed and prosperous. Beijing and Shanghai do not represent China, a vast country with up to 300 million impoverished people.
A socially-responsible factory in China should be held up as a model for irresponsible factories in China, not lauded as an example of why Westerners shouldn’t naively assume every factory in China is a sweatshop.