China Labour Bulletin appears in the following article. Copyright remains with the original publisher.
Conditions improve in China
For factory workers, conditions and attitudes are better
Jim Landers
The Dallas Morning News
28 March 2005
Women workers are beginning to assert their rights and demand higher wages and better benefits in this city infamous for its sweatshops.
"I enjoy my life here. It's better than it would be at home," said Liu Qin, an 18-year-old from a farm village who makes reflecting tape for road signs in a Shenzhen factory."If I get tired of this job, I'll get another one," she said over the blare of a dance tune in a Shenzhen disco.
The prospect of employment mobility speaks volumes about the changes under way in China, at the far end of a consumer-goods chain that eventually reaches to U.S. stores such as Wal-Mart, Kmart and Target.
Wages remain far below U.S. levels, of course, so labor-intensive items such as coats, shoes and toys – and caps emblazoned with a NASCAR or longhorn logo – are still made here for far less than in the United States.
But a combination of forces, from a better rural economy in China to anti-sweatshop campaigns in the United States, is reshaping China's manufacturing juggernaut.
Many of Shenzhen's thousands of factories are short of workers, and wages have risen to the point that several plants are moving to cheaper locations.
Biggest of all may be the change in the attitude of the workers themselves – a potentially far-reaching transformation as China entrenches itself ever more deeply into the global economy.
"They have a new sense of legal entitlement," said Allen Choate of the Asia Foundation, which runs educational programs for Shenzhen factory women. "They've been taught in school to regard themselves as citizens, so when they run into these abuses, they say, 'Hey, you can't do that to me.' "
Boomtown
In the 25 years since former leader Deng Xiaoping chose this city to start turning China into what he called a "socialist market economy," more than 5.5 million migrant workers – 80 percent of them women – have moved to Shenzhen.
At the beginning, the investors who built the factories were from Hong Kong. Taiwanese, Korean and Japanese investors followed. The money and sweat of the women who poured into the city became a dynamo for the Chinese economy.
Shenzhen grew as much as 45 percent a year. What was a fishing village across the border from Hong Kong became a city of 8 million, bigger than Hong Kong itself.
Like other boomtowns, Shenzhen grew recklessly, ahead of the rule of law. Factory managers worked the women 12 hours a day, seven days a week. Wages came to about $50 a month. Some workers were billed for company housing and had their wages withheld to pay rent or to keep them from leaving. Those who complained or were injured were dismissed.
Today the minimum wage is $58 a month. Liu Qin said that, after two years on the job, she works about 45 hours a week and makes $109 a month.
While such wages make it impossible for U.S. workers to compete, plant managers in Shenzhen say their products compete with other Asian producers rather than American plants.
One such Shenzhen company is Mainland Headwear Holdings Ltd., which employs 3,000 workers at a suburban factory making 30 million baseball caps a year.
Chairman Ngan Hei Keung and his wife, Pauline, started the firm as a Hong Kong trading company that sold hats. In 1992, the Ngans built a factory in Shenzhen and started making hats for U.S. sports leagues and universities, many through licenses held by Drew Pearson Marketing of Addison. (Mainland Headwear bought Drew Pearson Marketing in 2003.)
Higher expectations
In the company's first years as a manufacturer, salaries averaged about $48 a month. The company built a new factory with improved amenities for workers in 2003. Salaries now average $100 a month.
"There are now more job choices, and more competition for workers," Mr. Ngan said.
Several employees have worked for the company for 10 or more years. The company provides housing for some married couples, though it does not allow children in the company dormitories.
U.S. sporting goods companies such as Nike Inc. were criticized in the 1990s for running Asian sweatshops, and many now impose standards on their suppliers.
Mainland Headwear's employee bulletin board has the Nike Code of Conduct posted in English and Chinese. The factory is inspected once a month and faces unannounced workplace audits as well.
The company works with U.S. customers on more than 5,000 hat designs a year and integrates those into embroidery machines.
"We meet our customers' code of conduct. But apart from that, as Chinese society becomes more advanced, workers expect more for themselves," Mr. Ngan said. "It's not just a glass of water and a bowl of rice anymore. Expectations are higher."
Wang Teng-feng, who heads the workplace practice of the Guangdong Zhiming law firm, agreed.
"There were a lot of abuses in the '90s and early in this decade, where workers, especially the girls, were exploited by the factory bosses," he said. "Now the situation seems to be improving. The law on labor has improved. And there's more awareness than there was before, especially among the working girls."
Thousands of complaints have flooded Shenzhen courts, and investigative journalism about employee abuse is given prominent display in Chinese newspapers.
Shenzhen workers have staged many spontaneous demonstrations to protest wages and have on occasion staged strikes. China recognizes only one labor union, the government's All China Federation of Trade Unions, and strikes are illegal.
A recent walkout at a Shenzhen printed circuit board factory attracted media attention and intervention by the Shenzhen government. The strike ended when the company agreed to 150 percent pay increases, said Robin Munro, research director with the China Labour Bulletin in Hong Kong.
"Shenzhen workers have been voting with their feet over awful wages and the high cost of living," he said.
Liao Biag-biag, a 19-year-old at the Tyn-yo Technology Co. that makes reflecting tape, said she came to Shenzhen two years ago from a farm village. In that time, Ms. Liao said, she's had only one complaint with her employers.
"The white-collar workers look down on us rural girls," she said. "I plan to stay here for two more years. Then I want to go home to a technical school to learn computer skills so I can get a better job here in Shenzhen where they won't look down on me."