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In the article “Apple 'failing to protect Chinese factory workers'” my topic is presented through real experiences by an undercover BBC Panorama investigation reporter who went into a Pegatron factory to get the real inside story. The article is also targeting Apple specifically stating that “Apple's promises to protect workers were routinely broken.” Throughout the article the company repeatedly states that “They are aware of no other company doing as much as Apple to ensure fair and safe working conditions.” But the entire article is proving their statements incorrect. By what could be real footage of workers in Shanghai, passing-out/sleeping on the job from 12 to 18 hour shifts. The information also comes from standards on workers' hours, ID cards, dormitories, work meetings and juvenile workers according to the article. I also do not detect any bias in this article which makes it seem more trusting and factual.

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“Mattel's real toy story: slave labor in sweatshops” is about how toy companies are overworking workers. The article tells about the horribly living situations, the unpaid and illegal overtime, the horrible pay, and hazardous surroundings that the workers must work in. “Here in the Pearl River Delta, China, the pollution levels are on average two or three times those permitted in the West. with its swirling red dust, toxic rivers and thick, choking smog that hovers everywhere, stinging eyes and throats.” Most of the information in the article comes from real people who work in this factory. They also come from interviews of people who work non-stop in the factory. There does not happen to be any biased opinions in this article all information given is either from a real person or is a statistic.

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This article has no bias in it all information is from a worker, statistics, real observations by the reporter. The article was written in a manor almost of someone giving feedback on a report they had read but, in a good way. After each piece of information there is something or someone backing the statement. An example would be “ a series of reports from the Asia Floor Wage Alliance suggests that little has been done to improve conditions for garment workers in developing Asian nations.” “ it says that most Cambodians in Walmart supplier factories work under "highly exploitative" contracts that "leave them susceptible to unsafe working conditions, low wages, denial of benefits and harsh penalties for engaging in union activity -- including termination of employment."” The reporter stated that there were reports taken and then gave results of said reports which helps reassure the reader that what they are reading may reliable.

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This article is presented to the reader as if someone was giving a tour of the sweatshop. With information about how things worked and where they were in between. The article also makes sure to give backstory as to how the shop came to be. For example “Since 2003, China has invested at least 70 percent of its foreign direct investment into African nations. Back home, China has been universally applauded for reversing the story of hardship in its own nation as a result of its historic economic growth, which has lifted 500 million people out of poverty. And abroad, China is also responsible for helping to change the narrative throughout Africa with the roads, hospitals, schools, and manufacturing jobs that Chinese investment has created.” This helps the reader understand how things came to be and also helps them to feel reassured that they aren’t reading fake news. I don’t detect any bias in the article and the information given was supported with pictures and statistics. Assuming that the pictures are from where they say they are too.

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This article presents the topic of sweatshops in china with statistics on what the workers have to go through. Appealing to the emotions of their readers going into depth on the mistreatment of the workers. With workers ranging from the ages of 13 and older the article displays the woes that they have to endure. Whether it be pictures or statements from the workers. However there is an ideological bias that the author displays in the article by appealing to the emotions as well as the intelligence of the audience. “There are approximately 150 million internal migrant workers in China who, because of their status, do not receive any state benefits or protection.” This quote along with many others displays this ideological bias.

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This article presents the topic with an opening title, “China swaps sweatshops for smart tech in bid to reclaim lost ground.” By using this title they appeal to the business side of things,because all throughout the article they show the benefits of not using sweatshops versus easy to use tech. In the article the author also appeals to their audience’s empathy by using a quote from one of the workers. “We’ve had enough of those days when we earned so little by making goods for big brands”. There is an ideological bias presented in this article being that the article mainly focuses on opinions and includes factual evidence about the benefit of having a safer more efficient system.

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This is yet another article that appeals to the emotions of the audience, using pictures and factual evidence. The author is using a cultural bias to help the reader to see the injustice and unfair treatment of the employers. The author solely focuses on the amount of working hours that the workers ,under the age of 16 ,have to work. “One 15-year-old worker from Wenshan, Yunnan, was quoted as saying he works at least 28 days a month, starting work each day at 7.30am and never finishing before 10pm.” This is the type of statement that the author Mandy Zou uses to persuade her readers into seeing her point of view.

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The article’s title is “When “Made in China” means Sustainable, Ethical, and Expert.” This is to display the idea of a a new type of system where workers are given a new type of labour experience. The article provides ideals and experimental results that draws the audience's attention. The author goes into detail of Ivanka Trumps involvement in the matter. Then further describes the amount of work hours and pay that the workers have.Just last month, the Washington Post revealed that the factory making Ivanka Trump’s clothing line compels employees to work 57 hours weekly, for just $62 a week, near or below China’s minimum wage.The bias of the article is ideological appealing to emotion intelligence and ideals.

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This article's title is, "China’s Mega Sweatshops: China’s Workers and the Emerging Youth “Intern Class”. This article is more from the point of view from students that have taken internships at certain companies, and have experienced the harsh environment. The author says, "These interns are often subjected to worse conditions and lower wages than the standard employees they work alongside in violation of China’s internship laws prohibiting 16- to 18-year old students from working overtime and night shifts." This quote infers that even as interns, the individuals are subjected to the unfavorable environment and treated even as they have already worked there. "Interns are excluded from core social-welfare obligations that accompany standard employment, saving companies from matching payments, while they work the comparable, backbreaking hours, often as many as 60 hours a week including overtime", this quote explains the settings and the struggles the students endure as they work in this sweatshop. This information is more factual than opinions, which bring some validity to the topic and situation. I do not detect any bias within the article.

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This article is titled, "In Chinese Factories, Lost Fingers and Low Pay", and presents the topic of sweatshops in a way to emotionally appeal to the reader, as well as, inform the reader of the conditions within some sweatshops. However, the publisher presents the story with factual opinions from those familiar with the conditions of this particular sweatshop. "The group says some Chinese companies routinely shortchange their employees on wages, withhold health benefits and expose their workers to dangerous machinery and harmful chemicals, like lead, cadmium, and mercury." In this statement, you can see that the reader is being informed about how these workers are being treated. Two brother who both worked in this particular factory stated, "The brothers said they worked 12 hours a day, six days a week, for $120 to $200 a month, far less than they are required to be paid by law." This articles does not present any type of bias, due to the facts, and no distinct personal point of view.

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The article is titled, "Inside Apple's Chinese 'sweatshop' factory where workers are paid just £1.12 per hour to produce iPhones and iPads for the West", presents the topic of sweatshops in a way that informs one about the certain conditions, but within the article certain information seems to be exaggerated. "While the Nightline documentary knocks down those suggestions, it does show the suicide nets covering the whole site, in place to stop over-worked and stressed employees leaping to their deaths. Managers ordered asked for the nets to be put up two years ago after nine workers committed suicide in the space of three months." This quote suggests some exaggeration of the company installing nets due to their workers jumping to their deaths due to the harsh conditions of the workplace. However, the publisher/author, continues to tell about thing that have been said about how things work within the factory. "The broadcaster revealed that the entry-level salary of just £180 per month is so low that it would take more than two months salary to pay for the cheapest iPad. Even if the lowest earners do the maximum available overtime of 80 hours per month, they still do not earn enough to pay tax. Previous reports have claimed that some of the workers were doing 24 hours at a time, while others were forced to stand for their entire shifts." There is a bit of bias within the article, and a high level of exaggeration, to get a point across.

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The article is titled, "An Investigation into Four Toy Sweatshops", presents the topic of sweatshops in a way that appeals to the audience emotionally, to cause them to think about how the workers of their children's favorite toys are treated, "The world of toys is a heaven for children, but may be a world of misery for toy factory workers."  The author of this article also presents the topic with accurate photos taken of the workplace, to rightfully show the conditions, and inform the reader that change is needed. The author goes on to identify the various laws and rights violated, which includes accurate statistics and information necessary to backup  their statements. "According to Chinese Labor Law, laborers shall work no more than 8 hours a day. In general, work hours can be prolonged, under certain circumstances and under the condition that the physical health of laborers is guaranteed. Overtime hours, however, cannot exceed 36 hours a month. Unfortunately, we found that the average working hours in these four factories was 11 hours a day, with more than 50 overtime hours a month, and at half of the factories, overtime hours had reached 100 hours, with the highest at above 130 hours. Moreover, the extremely high production requirements left workers with barely any time to rest. During the 11 hours that workers put in within a day, all they had was a 40-60 minutes’ lunch break. This is an obvious violation of the right of workers’ to having adequate rest." I do identify any bias of this article.

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This article presents the topic by starting off with a personal story of one of the workers, Xiao Fang. It is meant to grab your attention because you know its an actual person being affected by these sweatshops while being mistreated. The article shows what it’s like working in the Mattel Factory in Chang’an. For Xiao, “She works 11-hour days, and six days a week, and shares a dormitory with nine other women and gets to see her husband only once a week.”. The article also mentioned Xiao having to leave her three-year-old daughter at home in Sichuan. The author shows that when undercover investigators enter four factories to understand the conditions of what the workers were going through, they were in contact with isoamyl acetate. While investigating, “staff claimed that the company offered prizes for the three most productive workers everyday. The prize was a pack of paper towels”. Not only were they being prized with minimal items but forced to work extreme over time and more during peak periods. While the investigator was still in the factory, they “interviewed workers in the cutting section, who said they sometimes clocked up to 100 hours of overtime a month”. These workers were forced to work in rooms that could be as hot as 31 degrees Celsius. I don’t detect any bias in the article due to it being based on facts and data collected by first hand investigators and the ICTI Care Foundation.

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In the article, “Chinese Toymakers Have Miserable Working Conditions, Low Pay”, the author starts of by stating a common quote used relating to this topic, “The world of toys is a heaven for children, but may be a world of misery for toy factory workers”. With the wages too low to begin with, “ the vast majority of workers request overtime in order to supplement their basic earnings”. The article presents the topic by giving statements from some of the workers found in these factories followed by facts of what is actually happening within them. During the production of toys in the factory, the workers are exposed to toxic solvents which were “distributed in unlabeled plastic drinking bottles”. With exposure to these toxic solvents it could be detrimental to the workers health. “ The U.S Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says isoamyl acetate is considered dangerous to life after five hours of exposure at certain concentration levels”. I don’t identify any bias in the article due to all the facts presented and the sources in which that information came from.

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This article presents the topic of sweatshops by giving a basic history lesson of what the labor standards have gone to over the years. The article is also meant to inform and educate on what previous situations have been regarding labor. In the third sentence of the second paragraph in the article, the author says “ In other words, we all share a part of responsibility in this”, referring to what labor conditions and child labor has become. This is a tactic that places a form of guilt on the reader thinking they are a part of the problem when it wasn’t them directly. It is meant to make the reader feel attached to the situation in a way that pulls on their emotions to want to know more. This makes the article slightly biased due to the author including this form of thought by attaching it to himself and others when the rest of the article is solely relating to the facts on labor conditions.The author also states that, “The recent recrudescence in forced labor is hard to measure because it’s largely hidden away in sweatshops and factories owned by large corporations”.

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This article presents the topic of sweatshops through factual evidence with given sources, videos of workers statements, and a visual map location of the Foxconn company. At Foxconn, “Violations against workers have already been widely reported over the last decade”. This has only gotten attention due to international media about the riots and suicides reported at Foxconn company. While the Fair Labor Association inspected three of their factories, “They reported severe health and safety risks, and excessive hours of overtime without appropriate payments”. Workers in the factories also have certain liberties taken away, for example, “Workers are prohibited from using certain devices, their rooms are raided, and if they are found to have broken any rules, they have to confess their guilt publicly.”. This not only means their privacy and property is being violated but they are being publicly shamed over using items that they own. Even when the workers have breaks, “Time off is usually only used for rest as people regularly work shifts of 11 to 13 hours”. In this article I don’t identify any bias used in the writing.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? 2014 December

Has the information been revised or updated? No

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? It’s current

Are the links functional? Yes

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? It answers my question and relates to my topic

Who is the intended audience? Adults or the people who keep up with bbc news, or an average person

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? It is appropriate, easy to comprehend

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? Yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? The author is Richard Bilton and the sponser is bbc news

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? No only a name

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? There are none given to prove that the author is qualified

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? No

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org
The url is a .com and I feel it would bethe same as cnn.com, it’s just not as well known
Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? Shanghai

Is the information supported by evidence? Yes

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? It may have been reviewed

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? Yes

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? It is free of emotion

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? No

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? Inform

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? Yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? Fact

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? Impartial

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? No

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Poor treatment of workers in Chinese factories which make Apple products has been discovered by an undercover BBC Panorama investigation.

Filming on an iPhone 6 production line showed Apple's promises to protect workers were routinely broken.

It found standards on workers' hours, ID cards, dormitories, work meetings and juvenile workers were being breached at the Pegatron factories.

Apple said it strongly disagreed with the programme's conclusions.

Exhausted workers were filmed falling asleep on their 12-hour shifts at the Pegatron factories on the outskirts of Shanghai.

One undercover reporter, working in a factory making parts for Apple computers, had to work 18 days in a row despite repeated requests for a day off.

Another reporter, whose longest shift was 16 hours, said: "Every time I got back to the dormitories, I wouldn't want to move.

"Even if I was hungry I wouldn't want to get up to eat. I just wanted to lie down and rest. I was unable to sleep at night because of the stress."

'Continuous improvement'

Apple declined to be interviewed for the programme, but said in a statement: "We are aware of no other company doing as much as Apple to ensure fair and safe working conditions.

"We work with suppliers to address shortfalls, and we see continuous and significant improvement, but we know our work is never done."

Apple said it was a very common practice for workers to nap during breaks, but it would investigate any evidence they were falling asleep while working.

It said it monitored the working hours of more than a million workers and that staff at Pegatron were averaging 55 hours a week.

The poor conditions in Chinese factories were highlighted in 2010 when 14 workers killed themselves at Apple's biggest supplier, Foxconn.

Following the suicides, Apple published a set of standards spelling out how factory workers should be treated. It also moved some of its production work to Pegatron's factories on the outskirts of Shanghai.

But Panorama's undercover reporters found that these standards were routinely breached on the factory floor.

Overtime is supposed to be voluntary, but none of the reporters were offered any choice. In addition to the excessive hours, one reporter had to attend unpaid meetings before and after work. Another reporter was housed in a dormitory where 12 workers shared a cramped room.

Apple says the dormitory overcrowding has now been resolved and that it requires suppliers to retroactively pay workers if it finds they haven't been paid for work meetings.

Pegatron said it was carefully investigating Panorama's claims and would take all necessary action if any deficiencies were found at their facilities.

"Worker safety and well-being are our top priorities. We set very high standards, conduct rigorous training for managers and workers, and have external auditors regularly visiting our facilities to find areas for improvement," a statement said.

Dangerous conditions

Panorama also travelled further down Apple's supply chain to the Indonesian island of Bangka.

Apple says it is dedicated to the ethical sourcing of minerals, but the programme found evidence that tin from illegal mines could be entering its supply chain.

It found children digging tin ore out by hand in extremely dangerous conditions - miners can be buried alive when the walls of sand or mud collapse.

Twelve-year-old Rianto was working with his dad at the bottom of a 70-foot cliff of sand. He said: "I worry about landslides. The earth slipping from up there to the bottom. It could happen."

Panorama tracked down a gang who collect tin from the area where Rianto was working. One of them said they sold tin to a smelter on Apple's list of suppliers.

Johan Murod, who runs one of the smelters on Apple's list, said 70% of the tin that is exported comes from the small-scale mines.

"At the smelter there's everything from both large and small scale mines. It's all mixed. There's no way to know what is legal and what is illegal."

Apple says it is a complex situation on Bangka with tens of thousands of miners selling tin through many middle men.

"The simplest course of action would be for Apple to unilaterally refuse any tin from Indonesian mines. That would be easy for us to do and would certainly shield us from criticism.

"But that would also be the lazy and cowardly path, since it would do nothing to improve the situation. We have chosen to stay engaged and attempt to drive changes on the ground."

Watch Panorama: Apple's Broken Promises on BBC One on 18 December at 21:00 GMT or watch later on BBC iPlayer.

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Apple 'failing to protect Chinese factory workers'

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Poor treatment of workers in the Chinese factories which make Apple products is discovered by an undercover BBC Panorama investigation.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? 2007 August

Has the information been revised or updated? Yes

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? Current

Are the links functional? Yes

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? Both

Who is the intended audience? Anyone at a high school reading level

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? Yes

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? Yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? Eric Clark is the author and the sponsor is dailymail.co.uk

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? No

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? No qualifications given

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? No

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org
It’s a .com so I believe it to be a credible source
Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? China

Is the information supported by evidence? Yes

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? Yes?

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? No

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? It seems unbiased

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? No

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? Inform

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? Yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? Fact

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? The point of view is impartial

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? No

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By ERIC CLARK

Last updated at 11:37 16 August 2007
This week Mattel recalled nearly two million Chinese-made toys over concerns they contain excessive levels of lead paint and loose parts. Dirt-cheap labour and a massive expansion in capacity means China makes more than three-quarters of the world's toys, with an export value in excess of £7 billion.
But increasingly, there is evidence of inadequate safety standards, poor quality control and slave labour.

Here, in an extract from his book about the toy industry, ERIC CLARK reveals the real cost of cheap toys from China.

Behind high fences, sprawling factory compounds stretch mile after dusty, depressing mile along the congested roads.

Guarded gates control entry and exit.

Adjoining many of the blocks are identical concrete boxes - the washing at the chicken wire-covered windows, adding flashes of colour, is the only indication that these are the dormitories for workers.

Here in the Pearl River Delta, China, the pollution levels are on average two or three times those permitted in the West.

But without places like this, with its swirling red dust, toxic rivers and thick, choking smog that hovers everywhere, stinging eyes and throats, the modern toy industry would not exist.

This is the hidden face of the trade where toys are produced for a few pence each by vast numbers of young Chinese people toiling in sweatshop conditions.

Between shifts the workers, mostly young women, their faces set in exhaustion, shuffle from building to building.

Shifts can last more than 15 hours a day, seven days a week - unlawful but far from uncommon.

The dominance of China in toy production is staggering.

There are about 8,000 factories employing some three million workers spread over six areas, of which the Pearl River Delta is by far the largest.

Virtually all the familiar Western toy names - led by U.S. giants Mattel and Hasbro - are made here. These workers make 80 per cent of all America's toys.

In children's picture books, Santa's beaming elves may still be making the toys, but the reality is that for elves we should read migrants - millions of them who have travelled by bus from rural areas up to three days' journey away, part of the biggest movement of people in human history.

Since the migration began, more than 50 million have passed through the factories of Guangdong province, where the Pearl River Delta lies.

If it is almost impossible to comprehend the scale of the movement of people, it is even more difficult for a Westerner to imagine the daily life of one of these toy workers.

Conditions obviously vary, from the acceptable to the unimaginably awful, but it is possible, from a host of reports and interviews conducted well away from factory premises, to construct a composite of the life and working conditions of one of the workers.

Li Mei is worn out, so she looks older than her 18 years.

Her skin is bad from too little daylight and she has many healing and still-open cuts on her hands.

Her neck, chest and forearms are heavily mottled with the raised red patches of allergy caused by toxic chemicals, which she scratches as she speaks.

She coughs a lot, and has chronic aches and pains, frequent headaches and blurred vision.

All these ailments have appeared during the past two years.

Li Mei is a migrant from the rural province of Western Sichuan.

At first, she is thrilled to be one of the dagongmei - the working girls - and to leave the hamlet where there are no roads and only limited electricity.

But she is frightened because the factories have a reputation as sweatshops.

Many return with disfigurements and illnesses.

And there was the fate of Li Chunmei.

Lin Chunmei, 19, was a 'runner' in the Bainan Toy Factory, rushing stuffed animals from one worker to the next for each step in production.

It was said she ran 16 hours a day, seven days a week, for two solid months.

Lin Chunmei was paid the equivalent of 7 pence an hour.

She collapsed one night, bleeding from nose and mouth, and was found hours later. She died before the ambulance arrived. Her parents were told it was an 'unknown death' and received a small sum in compensation.

But the villagers said it was the new disease, death from overwork.

Li Mei is certain nothing like this will happen to her: she is strong, accustomed to physically demanding tasks such as drawing water and cutting wood.

Her parents have borrowed heavily to buy the various personal documents she needs.

In four or five years, she plans to go home, buy a house and get married. She thinks about this all the time.

The factory where she toils is one of three buildings in a compound with high fences and a sliding metal gate, where two guards check everyone going in and out.

Beside it stands a warehouse and dormitory block. Li Mei's dormitory is on the eighth floor, a small room about 12 by 23 feet.

There are 32 rooms like it on this floor.

It is lit by a single fluorescent bar - her wages have the electricity costs docked - and the floor is concrete.

Double and triple bunk beds made of metal take up every inch of wall space.

During peak periods, when the factory takes on extra staff, girls often sleep two to a single bed.

Under the window, a grubby sink has a single tap. A notice is stuck to the wall, rules which another girl reads to her.

There are many, so she can remember only a few: 'No step on grass, offenders will be fined 50 yuan (£3.30).'

'No male or female staff going to the other gender's dormitory. The offender will be fired.'

Li Mei waits in a long queue of girls for the bathroom that two dozen people use to shower and wash their clothes.

She is still there at midnight, when everyone in the village has long been asleep, but the workers are only just off shift, too tired even to grumble as they wait in line.

Sometimes, the girl beside her says, 'there is no water even to brush your teeth, and the toilet is horrible.' The water (which, like lavatory paper, Li Mei is charged for) is cold.

By 2am she is finally in her lower bunk bed, separated from the hard surface by a straw mat even thinner than the one she uses at home.

Next morning she has no breakfast, for it is a meal she has to buy and prepare herself.

At 7.30am, in factory uniform of blue blouse with a white collar over trousers with her ID card displayed (she would be fined two days' wages if it was lost), she follows her guide through passages lined with cardboard boxes.

The air in the spraying and colouring department is filled with paint dust and smells sourly of chemicals -acetone, ethylene, trichloride, benzene.

The windows are fitted with wire mesh, the exits locked to prevent pilfering.

Noisy ventilators add to the din of the machines so the team leader has to shout to be heard.

Li Mei is given a blue apron and shown how to paint the eyes of the dolls with four pens of different sizes: she has to paint one every 7.2 seconds - 4,000 a day.

By the end of the second day, Li Mei's cotton mask and gloves are thick with paint particles and difficult to use.

She asks for new ones but is refused.

During the first few days, she finds the heat combined with the smell of chemicals repulsive.

She feels sick, has stomach-aches and is dizzy.

Once, when she faints, her section leader tells her to rest, rub on some herbal ointment then return to work.

Li Mei sneezes constantly and her eyes stream.

The bosses move her to the moulding department.

She feels a blast of heat - she is told later it rises to 104F - when the door is opened.

She is told to watch the other workers and then begins to stamp out parts of plastic dolls with repetitive movements performed many times a minute, 3,000 times a day.

Gloves are issued but no one can wear them - it is unbearably hot and they make it difficult to handle the tiny plastic parts: once the production line starts, her hands and eyes cannot stop for a minute.

Li Mei has to learn a lot of rules because she will be fined for any infringement.

Her section leader tells her there is to be no chatting, joking, laughing or quarrelling.

She must not disturb anyone's work, nap, or read a newspaper.

She must not fail to punch her work card, nor must she punch in for another worker.

She will lose two hours' wages for each minute she is late, and for half an hour she will lose a day's pay. For poor quality work, she may be dismissed or fined.

So she works carefully - and that means too slowly, so she is fined two days' pay.

Like most workers, Li Mei knows within a month that she is being unlawfully exploited.

She soon has wounds on her hands and elbows, and burn marks on her uniform.

When she is moved to a job trimming the plastic toys with small sharp knives, she often cuts herself, once so badly that her hand bleeds heavily - but the medical box is locked.

So she binds the wound up in cloth.

Worse things happen: workers in the die-casting and moulding departments lose fingers and even arms, while hole-making workers often have their hands punctured and crushed because they have no reinforced gloves.

With her tiny pay and all her debts, Li Mei cannot save.

She cannot resign from the factory but must apply for 'voluntary automatic leave'.

This means she would be severing the 'work contract' at her request.

As punishment she must forfeit one-and-a-half months' wages.

Without that, she does not have enough for the fare home.

Li Mei says: "I'm tired to death and I don't earn much.

"It makes everything meaningless." All she can do is go on.

"When we are working at the factory, we belong to the factory."

The American toy industry dominates the whole of the globe.

It is a $22 billion business. Every year it puts almost 3.6 billion toys into the home market alone, including 76 million dolls, 349 million plush toys, 125 million action figures, 279 million Hot Wheels and Matchbox cars.

Yet the toy business is no longer fun and games.

It's a harsh, corporate world, driven by social and demographic changes, concerns about stock prices and fierce battles between global brands.

By law, the maximum any Chinese worker should be on the assembly line is 53 hours per week.

But the China Labour Bulletin, a Hong Kong-based journal supporting independent unions and workers' rights, says 80 hours is common.

"Mattel has no way to know the truth about what really goes on here," said one worker. "Every time there is an inspection, the bosses tell us what lies to say."

This was supported by others who said that managers promised them extra pay if they pretended that they worked only eight hours a day, six days a week.

One government official, speaking on condition of anonymity, revealed that when government officers or foreign business executives visit the factories, the managers are tipped off beforehand and under-age workers are sent home.

In August 2006, the Chinese press carried the story of a female migrant worker who died from brain-stem bleeding after reportedly working non-stop for 21 hours in a toy factory in Zengzheng county in Guangzhou.

But it is unrealistic to expect that Chinese manufacturers will voluntarily improve conditions for workers.

The crux of the problem is this: by demanding that their suppliers produce goods at ever cheaper prices and demanding deadlines, the toy industry is almost forcing them to act illegally, despite the codes of practice it struggles to impose on them.

For consumers, this presents a dilemma which was neatly summed up for me by a couple pushing a loaded trolley down the toy aisles of a large superstore last Christmas.

"They're probably made under awful conditions but what do you do?" they asked.

"Accept it, or leave the kids with nothing."

The answer is not a boycott of Chinese toys.

Forcing factories to close and throwing millions of people out of work would harm the very people it was meant to help.

Instead, we must protest to the toy companies that we won't accept playthings for our kids which have been produced under horrific conditions and at the expense of workers.

After all, as this week's recall of Chinese-made toys shows, we too could end up paying a high price just for the benefit of buying cheap toys.
The Real Toy Story by Eric Clark is published by Black Swan at £8.99. To order a copy (p&p free), call 0870 161 0870.

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Mattel's real toy story: slave labour in sweatshops

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By ERIC CLARK Last updated at 11:37 16 August 2007 This week Mattel recalled nearly two million Chinese-made toys over concerns they contain excessive levels of lead paint and loose parts. Dirt-cheap labour and a massive expansion in capacity means China makes more than three-quarters of the world's toys, with an export value in excess of £7 billion.

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Workers at Asia factories that supply Walmart, H&M and Gap are still being exploited in sweatshop conditions, three years after the deadly collapse of a Bangladeshi factory, according to a worker rights group.

Workers in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India and Indonesia who make clothes for Walmart face "intensive labour exploitation and abuse," according to a report released Tuesday by the Asia Floor Wage Alliance, an international coalition of trade unions and human rights organizations.

In 2013, a building collapse in Bangladesh killed 1,127 garment workers, creating an international outcry about the human toll of making cheap, fast fashion clothes for wealthier nations like the U.S.

But a series of reports from the Asia Floor Wage Alliance suggests that little has been done to improve conditions for garment workers in developing Asian nations.

The Asia Floor Wage Alliance says its report "identifies persistent rights violations" against Walmart supply chain workers in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India and Indonesia. The report is based on interviews with 344 workers, many of them women, at 80 Walmart supplier factories. It says that many of the workers, particularly in Cambodia and India, complained of sexual harassment.

Related: 7.9% GDP still isn't good enough for India

The report identifies specific problems in each country. For example, it says that most Cambodians in Walmart supplier factories work under "highly exploitative" contracts that "leave them susceptible to unsafe working conditions, low wages, denial of benefits and harsh penalties for engaging in union activity -- including termination of employment." This includes "forced overtime" during Cambodia's hottest season, leading to "mass fainting episodes resulting from over exertion, exacerbated by inadequate nutrition."

The report also says that Walmart "refused" to sign the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, a pact by 190 clothing brands as well as trade unions to inspect factories for fire, electrical and structural safety. Gap didn't join the accord, either. Instead, Walmart and Gap formed a group called the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety.

Guillermo Meneses, spokesman for the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, said his group has compensated factory workers, trained them in fire safety and provided a factory worker helpline for fire safety and "worker empowerment."

But this has not improved conditions, according to the report.

The alliance also targeted Gap in a separate report, complaining of forced overtime, poverty level wages and physical punishment or illegal termination of workers in Bangladesh, including pregnant women.

"Gap lies far behind other brands in their commitments to decent work and safe workplaces," says the report.

Related: Beyoncé fashion line fights sweatshop accusations

Gap spokeswoman Laura Wilkinson told CNNMoney that "we recognize that the global apparel industry still faces challenges." She said the company is working with garment workers, suppliers, unions and governments "to develop solutions that matter most to workers and contribute most directly to improving their lives."

Walmart spokeswoman Marilee McInnis said the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, of which it is a member, and the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, of which it is not, "are essentially parallel paths forward," with "a common goal to improve the lives of garment workers in Bangladesh by upgrading factory fire and safety conditions."

H&M did join the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, along with Adidas , American Eagle, Fruit of the Loom and Abercrombie & Fitch . But that didn't stop the alliance from issuing a third, scathing report about H&M, alleging "intensive labour exploitation and abuse faced by workers in H&M supply chains in Cambodia and India."

A spokeswoman for H&M said, "H&M has been working actively for many years to help strengthen the textile workers' conditions. The challenges addressed in the report on industry wide and we firmly believe that in addition to our efforts as an individual company, collaboration is key."

CNNMoney (New York) First published May 31, 2016: 11:47 AM ET

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Report slams Walmart for 'exploitative' conditions in Asia factories

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Workers in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India and Indonesia who make clothes for Walmart face "intensive labour exploitation and abuse," according to a report released Tuesday by the Asia Floor Wage Alliance, an international coalition of trade unions and human rights organizations.

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Shoppers everywhere have seen (and maybe even bought) the counterfeit shoes, bags, and clothing that line the walls of stalls along Canal Street in New York City or are hawked by vendors in nearly any major city in America. But, aside from worrying about their dubious quality, few of us stop to think about the real cost of those bogus goods - namely, how it affects the workers who make them.

And, contrary to the stereotype many of us have, these knockoffs aren't just made in China anymore. Counterfeiting shoes, clothes, and bags is a billion-dollar industry on the rise, and those products can come from all around the globe, including from Chinese-owned factories in Africa.

Since 2003, China has invested at least 70 percent of its foreign direct investment into African nations. Back home, China has been universally applauded for reversing the story of hardship in its own nation as a result of its historic economic growth, which has lifted 500 million people out of poverty. And abroad, China is also responsible for helping to change the narrative throughout Africa with the roads, hospitals, schools, and manufacturing jobs that Chinese investment has created.

This past August, China and the East African nation of Tanzania signed a deal called the China Africa Development Fund. The agreement promises to allow more than 100 Chinese investors to invest directly in Tanzania's manufacturing industry, purportedly creating jobs and dismantling poverty. And though many in Tanzania are eager to see the nation jump-start its economy, China's labor practices have raised some serious red flags.

To find out more, I traveled to a Chinese-owned factory outside Tanzania's capital, Dar es Salaam, on a bright Sunday afternoon in August. I drove up to the long wall that fenced off the factories from the otherwise bare road. It was only when Chinese factory owner and manager Fei Lin opened a door along the wall of LMFLY Trading Corporation Ltd. that an assortment of buildings came into full view. My curiosity pushed me to ask Lin for a tour.

Ahead, rarely seen photos from inside one of Tanzania's counterfeit shoe sweatshops.
Photo caption: Male workers, some younger than 18, sit on the floor behind a pile of shoes. Some of the workers at LMFLY's factory were too young to work legally.
Author's note: Reporting for this story was made possible by the International Women's Media Foundation African Great Lakes Reporting Initiative.

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Haunting Photos Show The High Cost of Cheap Nikes

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Shoppers everywhere have seen (and maybe even bought) the counterfeit shoes, bags, and clothing that line the walls of stalls along Canal Street in New York City or are hawked by vendors in nearly any major city in America.

# data[].attributes.body
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China's Mega Sweatshops: China's Workers and the Emerging Youth "Intern Class"
Every day, the ranks of China's young workforce bubble with bright minds, a cosmopolitan vanguard, striving for a piece of the coveted "Chinese dream"- that level of technical and professional jobs and economic security never known to their parents' generation. But every day the race for Asia's globalization miracle masks a shadow labor market that uses the education system to exploit a hyper-competitive youth labor market, under crushing pressure to achieve middle-class status.
In September 2017, youth activists in Hong Kong launched a campaign to expose one facet of this growing phenomenon of youth in precarious manufacturing work: the labor advocacy group Students and Scholars against Corporate Misbehaviour (SACOM) called out one cutting-edge tech brand for perpetuating exploitative labor practices in its supply chains in China. The group's investigation into the Quanta Chongqing factory-a mega-industrial facility in one of China's rapidly developing inland cities, which Beijing has been promoting as rising global export hubs-revealed a small army of young laborers. Although these student workers were, on paper, described as temporary interns, presumably apprenticing for skilled positions in electronics-they hardly matched the international profile of China's best and brightest marching toward technological progress: rather, they were, according to a recent research investigation, often engaged in the grudge work of neoliberal capital, toiling as many as 12 hours a day, sometimes overnight, without the standard labor protections afforded to regular workers and in gross violation of China's regulations for protecting student interns.

SACOM accused Quanta, a Taiwanese-owned subcontractor for some of the world's leading tech brands, of forcing student interns to work under harsh conditions under the guise of educational programming. The work performed, according to the group's investigation, had little to do with training, nor was it compensated according to the skills or time they had invested in vocational school programs. And on an institutional level, their role as cogs in Apple's supply chain fueled a wider phenomenon of student workers being drafted as inexpensive "surplus" labor for China's export economy.

Ironically, these youth also fit the demographic profile of China's emerging consumer class, who relish their Apple, Samsung and Microsoft products as icons of a new material culture. The two sides of China's millennial caste-the surging "youthquake" of mass consumption, alongside an increasingly precarious and alienated wave of young low-wage workers, many of them among China's three hundred million rural migrants-represent two faces of China's rising young masses. Trapped between soaring ambitions and increasingly constricted prospects for social advancement, they are tethered to a labor market and a product market built on Digital Age sweatshops.
A "Social Responsibility" Crisis
Following SACOM's report, Quanta, a leading producer of laptops, and other electronic products denied the allegations in the press, though it did not directly refute the group's claims. But SACOM's campaign primarily targeted the top of the supply chain, calling on Apple to adhere to its Corporate Social Responsibility code by reining in exploitation of student workers and pushing to improve wages and working conditions at its suppliers. Though Apple has publicly denied SACOM's claims on their specific charge that its longtime supplier Quanta was directly producing the Apple Watch Series 3 model in question at the Chonqing plant. However, activists dispute Apple's refutation, saying their investigations show that the company is still profiting from its intern workforce on an ongoing basis, though it appears to have since severed a specific recent contract under pressure. Recently, in fact, Apple issued its own report conceding that an internal audit had uncovered labor exploitation of interns at a different facility run by another major multinational electronics supplier, Foxconn, its leading supplier and China's largest industrial employer with more than one million workers..

Following a similar pattern of plausible deniability, HP did not respond specifically to the charges following SACOM's reports, but later told The Guardian that it closely regulates its supply chain to ensure compliance with local labor standards. Multinational brands often distance themselves from smaller under-regulated subcontractors at the base of its supply chain. Following a labor scandal, tech giants routinely promise to investigate such incidents under their voluntary social responsibility codes. But while companies perfunctorily reassure the public they will self-regulate their sourcing, the usual methods of internal supply-chain monitoring and factory audits have been criticized as ineffective whitewashing by independent advocacy groups.

More broadly, the reports of widespread intern abuse represent the standard, not the exception, in China's low-wage manufacturing system. With more development into regional interior cities and manufacturing investment shifting to cheaper parts of Asia, the workforce is being dispersed across more remote areas, and labor watchdogs warn of downward pressure on wages and a decline in government regulation of working conditions.

An analysis from Hong Kong Polytechnic University researcher Jenny Chan (who is also a contributing editor of The Asia Pacific Journal) describes an intern labor pipeline in which significant numbers of the 18 million youth in vocational schools find themselves programmed as labor bots, powering assembly lines through the systematic cheapening of student labor presented as internships. These interns are often subjected to worse conditions and lower wages than the standard employees they work alongside in violation of China's internship laws prohibiting 16- to 18-year old students from working overtime and night shifts. According to Chan, across China's manufacturing sector, scarcely regulated networks of low-wage casual student labor enable both government and commercial profiteers to profiteer from a "two-tier" labor system, under a legal rubric of vocational education.

China's electronics-export sector banks on young people's career aspirations to fill spots in its supply chain. As the exclusionary university exam system shunts millions of "leftover" Chinese students into vocational schools. The system is driven by and perpetuates collusion with multinationals with interns channeled into high-tech low-skill factories: as Chinese wages have risen with global manufacturing investments over the last decade, the internship infrastructure has simultaneously emerged as a way for huge corporations, including Honda and another massive Apple contractor, Foxconn, to circumvent regulations and strip student-workers of their labor rights. Foreign-contracted Chinese firms exploit young workers as disposable seasonal labor required to work long illegal overtime hours to meet peak-season production demands (as when a new iPhone rolls out), at the expense of their families, the school system, and low-wage workers of all skill levels.

Yet some of the hyperexploited interns in the investigation have sometimes displayed a savvy awareness of their degraded status. A 16-year-old interviewee told researchers: "Come on, what do you think we've learned standing for more than ten hours a day manning machines on the line?...There's no relation to what we study in school. Every day is just a repetition of one or two simple motions, like a robot."

Since the student workforce churns seasonally with the academic calendar, these feeder programs offer no professional development opportunities or promotional prospects. Interns are excluded from core social-welfare obligations that accompany standard employment, saving companies from matching payments, while they work the comparable, backbreaking hours, often as many as 60 hours a week including overtime. The paternalistic social structure, typically constructed around a dorm-like living arrangement, is designed to present a youthful atmosphere. But the insularity of the intern's work-lives, coupled with the constant surveillance of their activities, risks eroding student-workers' sense of personal autonomy as lines between their jobs and private lives blur.

The main feeders for this workforce are vocational institutions that, like for-profit trade schools in the United States, reflect the corporatization and commercialization of the "middle tier" education system. Since internships are incorporated into the training-while heavily promoted by local governments and teachers as a career springboard-young interns enter jobs hoping to prepare for careers as technicians, healthcare workers, or business managers. But by the time they discover they've been piped into seasonal grunt work on electronics-assembly lines with no training in their specializations, their time is already firmly controlled by their quasi-employers, who, through shady contract arrangements with schools and labor agencies, are able to expand work terms "to meet production needs, ranging from three months to a full year, with scant regard for student training needs."

At Foxconn, China's largest industrial employer, for example, students who are legally exempt from "medical insurance, work injury insurance, unemployment benefits, maternity insurance, and old age pensions" are also, because of their trainee status, excluded from the standard on-the-job "skills subsidy" for long-term workers, despite being typically underpaid.

Student interns en route to their assignments

At Quanta Chongqing, similarly, recruiting firms had reportedly drawn students from local vocational schools, helping to stock the assembly lines with more than 60 percent of the total workforce, according to one mid-level manager. In language reflecting the on-demand global tech economy, he explained to researchers that students served as a more "flexible" spigot of labor than the older worker pool who might be hired for longer-term jobs: "It takes only a few weeks," he said, "to order those students from the schools....The factory doesn't want to keep too many regular workers as it gets far fewer orders during low seasons. You can't easily fire workers if they are regular employees, but you can tell the interns to leave at almost any time.

SACOM has accused Quanta of violating both domestic labor law and Apple's corporate code of conduct. Existing policies require generally that student internships in the manufacturing sector involve work relevant to their major. But overall, the intern experience today reflects the structural incentives in the neoliberal global economy to rely on a fluid, liminal workforce of expendable workers, as interchangeable as the widgets they produce.

The charges brought against Quanta fit a grimly familiar pattern of young students being pressed to work in manufacturing facilities as part of a school-mandated internship. But the persistence of the pattern over years, despite existing laws limiting internships to education-related activities, show that current oversight mechanisms are failing. Whether this is a product of suppliers managing to continue finding ways to circumvent the law, often in collusion with local governments, or of regulators being under-resourced or corrupted, a sense of malign neglect surrounds the supply network. This is most clearly borne out in the public denials among multinational firms operating in China. While companies like Apple may be technically able to downplay links to certain subcontractors with unsavory track records, watchdog reports regularly turn up contravening evidence, tracing at least some parts of various devices back to unregulated subcontracted facilities with brutal labor practices. The links are often indirect, and perhaps increasingly institutionalized, as complicity throughout the industry keeps global importers, China-based vendors, and multinational subcontractors intertwined under a status quo of mutually reinforcing profits.

According to Chan, because of the scarcity of decent job opportunities for students excluded from university, employers readily capitalize on the rising vocational-worker surplus, knowing that, by law, interns "don't have the right to join trade unions," and, in turn, "are wanted also because they can be used to break the strikes or to divide the labor force. This is integral to control of the work force."

Chan also argues that recent reforms purporting to standardize internships might have further entrenched the two-tier system, since the measures "institutionalized the reality that interns would be paid at 80 percent of employees of the same positions." So in effect, "the state is actively shaping and sustaining labor precarization."

There are signs that the government is getting more serious about cracking down on intern abuses and pressuring corporations to police their own supply chains. For example, the central government promulgated a new internship law for vocational students in April 2016, setting age limits on hiring students and adding parent consent mandates as well as standards for three-party contracts for schools, businesses and students. SACOM's report on Quanta notes that another Apple supplier, Foxconn Zhengzhou, under pressure from critics, issued a memorandum in the summer 2017 barring the hiring of all students under 22 years of age and clarifying vetting requirements for hiring older students.

Though this appears to indicate that the company, and Apple, as the chief contractor, are focused on compliance, the crisis at Quanta suggests that massive exploitation continues, even within a framework of voluntary corporate "compliance."

Moreover, Chan noted in follow-up correspondence that while the government moved to tighten regulations in 2016, recent labor investigations suggest the practice of pressing interns into excessive shifts has persisted at Foxconn, and the cases that have attracted media attention represent "probably the tip of a huge iceberg." Noting the role of global electronics brands in creating an "on demand" manufacturing system that relies on precarious intern labor, she adds that although there might be "pro-labor legislators at the center...the new rules on internship governance are weakly implemented thus far." Amid market forces buttressing corporate impunity, the integrity of the regulatory system may hinge on civil society and independent labor activism through grassroots initiatives like SACOM.
The Global Incorporation of Education in the Neoliberal Era
Once a vaunted institution of social advancement in Chinese society, vocational schools have turned into clearinghouses for working-class youth, as bosses and local officials pressure program managers to dispatch short-term laborers to meet companies' production goals. Yes, students nominally volunteer for these programs, but as Chan explains, interns are socialized and taught by teachers to "unthink exploitation" in a way that, in the eyes of the state, rationalizes the expropriation of their undervalued labor.

Parallel examples can be seen in the United States with a similar internship model that treats the pre-professional internship program (often available to college students or recent graduates) as a form of apprenticeship that is generally exempt from the federal regulatory standards that apply to regular workers. Instead, a parallel legal framework has emerged, one established about 70 years ago, long before they became a white-collar training ground in professions ranging from entertainment to law offices. Journalist and activist Ross Perlin has explored the structural implications of this for the wider US workforce, positing that equity at every level of labor is undermined when the law grants corporations unlimited authority to employ an underregulated contingent workforce with the intention of meeting spot labor demands with as few legal obligations as possible. Any two-tier system of labor, Perlin argues, promotes displacement and substandard work. This is even the case in white-collar professions when a surplus labor force is available, particularly when young trainees are desperate to "break into" a field. The system often operates with impunity in collusion between the intern's educational institution and the firm.

The pattern currently unfolding in China's student labor system illustrates one extreme example of the consequences of this convergence of educational, political, regulatory and business institutions in a cycle of exploitation and structural corruption, affecting the entire spectrum of the economic hierarchy, from the classroom to the corporate boardroom.
Intern Ethics
The fundamental ethical dilemma underlying the internship system is that interns eviscerate the wage system by allowing academic credit or ill-defined "learning experience" to lower or eliminate their compensation to the benefit of the firm. The legal definition of an internship requires that the work offer "primary benefit" in the form of vocational or educational reward, to the intern. But often, the employer capitalizes on degrading the real-life value of the work as a vocational program and by setting intern wages far below standard wages for workers they essentially replace. To an even greater extent, perhaps, than professional industries in the US, China's intern economy has been captured by a liminal labor infrastructure in which the state, corporations, and the educational bureaucracy cooperate to maximize production and profit at the student's expense.

Nonetheless, Perlin also reflects on the potential ramifications of reform-noting a backlash that has emerged recently in some industries as interns have taken legal action and campaigned to end the abuse of unpaid and underpaid internships. Though there has been some legal backslide, he argues that the momentum is on the side of the many workers at all tiers of the workforce who see the corrosive effects of internships on workplace standards. This will require, he points out in a recent commentary, stronger regulations that align internship conditions with those of federal labor law. As the two-tier structure is leveled out, he argues in a New York Times commentary, "those workers who have been displaced or in many cases replaced by unpaid labor, by unpaid interns, will benefit.

In China, a regulatory overhaul could yield similar benefits for students and the workers they often replace, if it provides a streamlined way of investing in their education in a career-track job. When the law incentivizes a more balanced distribution of jobs across different social segments, the resulting restructuring of the labor force will allow a more orderly economic procession that encourages more sustainable development, which the government is already trying to promote in order to harness the country's overheated expansion.

The tech sector might be especially primed for change, given the relative mobility and international exposure of the workforce: Part of China's recent efforts to reform intern labor has called for reducing the number of internships-for example, by aiming to cap intern employment at 10 percent of a facility's total workforce and no more than 20 percent of workers in a specific position-and importantly, ensuring some educational programming is incorporated into existing internships. International industry associations such as the Electronics Industry Citizenship Coalition have called for revamping vocational education systems in order to improve program quality. Still, applying these regulations remains dependent on the industry's willingness to pioneer a new model of public accountability and social sustainability, which is spurred from below by public pressure from the next generation of worker-consumers.

The trend of "proletarianization" of students should also inform American and global debates on the future of work. In the current national push to train and uplift the semi-skilled workforce and revive manufacturing after decades of offshoring, US communities should be wary of what kind of work President Trump is promising to "bring back" from abroad. The potential for shared exploitation-not the shared prosperity neoliberalism professes to give us-makes the rights and welfare of China's intern class deeply relevant as young workers worldwide grapple with the question of what kind of future they can build.
This is a revised and expanded version of an article that originally appeared at The Nation on May 31, 2017 under the title "Your Phone May Have Been Built by an Intern. Michelle Chen is a contributing writer at In These Times and The Nation, a contributing editor at Dissent and a co-producer of the "Belabored" podcast. She studies history at the CUNY Graduate Center, and tweets at @meeshellchen.
All images in this article are from the author.

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China's Mega Sweatshops: China's Workers and the Emerging Youth "Intern Class" Every day, the ranks of China's young workforce bubble with bright minds, a cosmopolitan vanguard, striving for a piece of the coveted "Chinese dream"- that level of technical and professional jobs and economic security never known to their parents' generation.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? January 5, 2008

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Are the links functional? Yes

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Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? Yes

Who is the intended audience? Anyone trying to understand working conditions of China

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? Yes

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? Yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? David Barboza/ Nnew York Times

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? Yes; correspondent for New York Times and freelance writer  & research assistance

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? Won various Pulitzer Prizes for explanatory writings and for his ability to explain what happens in China

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examples: .com .edu .gov .org  No

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? China

Is the information supported by evidence? yes

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? yes

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? Yes

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? No

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? No

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? to inform

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? Yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? Fact

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial?  impartial

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? No

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In recent weeks, a flood of reports detailing labor abuse have been released, at a time when China is still coping with last year's wave of product safety recalls of goods made in China, and as it tries to change workplace rules with a new labor law that took effect on Jan. 1.

No company has come under as harsh a spotlight as Wal-Mart, the world's biggest retailer, which sourced about $9 billion in goods from China in 2006, everything from hammers and toys to high-definition televisions.

In December, two nongovernmental organizations, or NGOs, documented what they said were abuse and labor violations at 15 factories that produce or supply goods for Wal-Mart - including the use of child labor at Huanya Gifts, a factory here in Guangzhou that makes Christmas tree ornaments.

Wal-Mart officials say they are investigating the allegations, which were in a report issued three weeks ago by the National Labor Committee, a New York-based NGO.

Guangzhou labor bureau officials said they recently fined Huanya for wage violations, but also said they found no evidence of child labor.

A spokesman for Huanya, which employs 8,000 workers, denied that the company broke any labor laws.

But two workers interviewed outside Huanya's huge complex in late December said that they were forced to work long hours to meet production quotas in harsh conditions.

"I work on the plastic molding machine from 6 in the morning to 6 at night," said Xu Wenquan, a tiny, baby-faced 16-year-old whose hands were covered with blisters. Asked what had happened to his hands, he replied, the machines are "quite hot, so I've burned my hands."

His brother, Xu Wenjie, 18, said the two young men left their small village in impoverished Guizhou Province four months ago and traveled more than 500 miles to find work at Huanya.

The brothers said they worked 12 hours a day, six days a week, for $120 to $200 a month, far less than they are required to be paid by law.

When government inspectors visit the factory, the young brothers are given the day off, they said.

A former Huanya employee who was reached by telephone gave a similar account of working conditions, saying many workers suffered from skin rashes after working with gold powders and that others were forced to sign papers "volunteering" to work overtime.

"It's quite noisy, and you stand up all day, 12 hours, and there's no air-conditioning," he said. "We get paid by the piece we make but they never told us how much. Sometimes I got $110, sometimes I got $150 a month."

In its 58-page report, the National Labor Committee scolded Wal-Mart for not doing more to protect workers. The group charged that last July, Huanya recruited about 500 16-year-old high school students to work seven days a week, often 15 hours a day, during peak production months for holiday merchandise.

Several students interviewed at the Guangzhou Technical School, less than two miles from Huanya, confirmed that classmates ages 16 to 18 had spent the summer working at the factory.

Some high school students later went on strike to protest the harsh conditions, the report said. The students also told labor officials that at least seven children, as young as 12 years old, were working in the factory.

"At Wal-Mart, Christmas ornaments are cheap, and so are the lives of the young workers in China who make them," the National Labor Committee report said.

Jonathan Dong, a Wal-Mart spokesman in Beijing, said the company would soon release details of its own investigation into working conditions at Huanya.

Labor rights groups have also criticized Disney and Dell. Officials of Disney and Dell declined to comment on specific allegations, but both companies say they carefully monitor factories in China and take action when they find problems or unfair labor practices.

"The Walt Disney Company and its affiliates take claims of unfair labor practices very seriously and investigates any such allegations thoroughly," the company said in a statement. "We have a strong commitment to the safety and well-being of workers, and fair and just labor standards."

Many multinationals were harshly criticized in the 1990s for using suppliers that maintained sweatshop conditions. Iconic brand names, like Nike, Mattel and Gap, responded by forming corporate social responsibility operations and working with contractors to create a system of factory audits and inspections. Those changes have won praise in some quarters for improving worker conditions.

But despite spending millions of dollars and hiring thousands of auditors, some companies acknowledge that many of the programs are flawed.

"The factories have improved immeasurably over the past few years," says Alan Hassenfeld, chairman of the toy maker Hasbro and co-chairman of Care, the ethical-manufacturing program of the International Council of Toy Industries. "But let me be honest: there are some bad factories. We have bribery and corruption occurring but we are doing our best."

Some factories are warned about audits beforehand and some factory owners or managers bribe auditors. Inexperienced inspectors may also be a problem.

Some major Western auditing firms working in China even hire college students from the United States to work during the summer as inspectors, an indication that they are not willing to invest in more expensive or sophisticated auditing programs, critics say.

Chinese suppliers regularly outsource to other suppliers, who may in turn outsource to yet another operation, creating a supply chain that is hard to follow - let alone inspect.

"The convoluted supply chain is probably one of the most underestimated and unrecognized risks in China," says Dane Chamorro, general manager for Greater China at Control Risks, a risk-consulting firm. "You really have to have experienced people on the ground who know what they're doing and know the language."

Many labor experts say part of the problem is cost: Western companies are constantly pressing their Chinese suppliers for lower prices while also insisting that factory owners spend more to upgrade operations, treat workers properly and improve product quality.

At the same time, rising food, energy and raw material costs in China - as well as a shortage of labor in the biggest southern manufacturing zones - are hampering factory owners' ability to make a profit.

The situation may get worse before it improves. The labor law that took effect on Jan. 1 makes it more difficult to dismiss workers and creates a whole new set of laws that experts say will almost certainly increase labor costs. Yet it may become more difficult for human rights groups to investigate abuses. Concerned about the growing array of threats to profitability, as well as embarrassing exposés, factories are heightening security, harassing labor rights groups and calling the police when journalists show up at their gates.

At the center of the problem is a labor system that relies on young migrant workers, who often leave small rural villages for two- or three-year stints at factories, where they hope to earn enough to return home to start families.

As long as life in the cities promises more money than in rural areas, they will brave the harsh conditions in factories in this and other Chinese cities. And as long as China outlaws independent unions and proves unable to enforce its own labor rules, there is little hope for change.

"This is a problem that has been difficult to solve," Liu Kaiming, the director of the Institute on Contemporary Observation, which aids migrant workers in nearby Shenzhen, said of sweatshop labor. "China has too many factories. The workers' bargaining position is weak and the government's regulation is slack."

There is little that any Western company can do about those issues, no matter how seriously they take corporate social responsibility - other than leaving China.

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far east  south and southeast asia and pacific areas

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In Chinese Factories, Lost Fingers and Low Pay

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In recent weeks, a flood of reports detailing labor abuse have been released, at a time when China is still coping with last year's wave of product safety recalls of goods made in China, and as it tries to change workplace rules with a new labor law that took effect on Jan.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? January 25, 2013

Has the information been revised or updated? Yes

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? current

Are the links functional? yes

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? yes

Who is the intended audience? Anyone trying to understand working conditions of China

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? yes

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? Rob Cooper

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? No

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic?  No

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address?  No

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org  No

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? Other sources

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Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? yes

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? yes

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? to inform

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? fact

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? impartial

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? no

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Inside Apple's Chinese 'sweatshop' factory where workers are paid just £1.12 per hour to produce iPhones and iPads for the West

Factories covered in suicide nets to stop workers leaping to their deaths

18 people have killed themselves at the facility

iPhone, iPad and MacBook assembled in factory in Shenzhen

Microsoft, Dell and Hewlett Packard products also built on site

Apple have opened the doors to their Chinese 'sweatshop' factories where employees are paid as little as £1.12 an hour.

Many of the staff perform monotonous tasks like wiping down screens or shaving aluminium from the edge of the Apple logo for ten tedious hours at a time.

And now the conditions inside the factory in Shenzhen - where 18 employees have killed themselves - can be seen, after ABC TV network were given exclusive access.

The broadcaster revealed that the entry-level salary of just £180 per month is so low that it would take more than two months salary to pay for the cheapest iPad.

Even if the lowest earners do the maximum available overtime of 80 hours per month, they still do not earn enough to pay tax.

Previous reports have claimed that some of the workers were doing 24 hours at a time, while others were forced to stand for their entire shifts.

While the Nightline documentary knocks down those suggestions, it does show the suicide nets covering the whole site, in place to stop over-worked and stressed employees leaping to their deaths.

Managers ordered asked for the nets to be put up two years ago after nine workers committed suicide in the space of three months.

Apple - the world's most valuable technology company - have faced claims that their contractors are forcing staff to do overtime involuntarily and employing underage workers at the factory.

It was in response to these attacks that Apple threw open their doors at the Foxconn City plant in Shenzhen, China.

Foxconn City is a unit of Taiwan's Hon Hai Precision Industry Company which employs up to 1.1million people in a series of huge factory complexes in China.

Liang Juan, 26, told ABC News that management is 'strict'.

Wearing a white boiler-suit in the spotless factory, it is her job to flip over camera lenses with a tiny pair of tweezers.

Asked what she thinks about when performing the dull task, she said: 'I don't think much about other things because the management is strict and we're busy working and have no time to think about other things.'

Despite the boring jobs unemployed young Chinese workers queue up for work - and employees say that working conditions are much better than at other factories.

An estimated 3,000 people were queuing at the gates to find work on one day when ABC News were there.

Workers are charged around £11 per month to share a dormitory with seven other people and pay around 50 pence for a rice dish in the cafeteria.

Apple have also allowed independent examiners from the Washington-based Fair Labour Association in to carry out inspections.

APPLE: ROTTEN IN CHINA?

The Foxconn City complex of factories, run by Foxconn Technology Group, employ 235,000 workers and Microsoft, Dell and Hewlett Packard projects are also built on the site.

In 2009, a Foxconn employee fell or jumped from an apartment building after losing an iPhone prototype.

Over the next two years, at least 18 other Foxconn workers were linked to attempted suicides.

Despite claims to the contrary, the abuses appear to have continued.

With demand for the firm's products soaring the factory is forced to churn out products in growing numbers. Last year they sold 93million iPhones, 40million iPads, 38million iPods and 17million computers.

The ABC journalists given unrestricted access to the site and freedom to talk to anyone found that staff were paid above the minimum wage - and no-one worked there below the age of 16.

Apple said 60,000 workers have been sent on college courses for free and they have informed one million staff of their legal rights.

Chief-executive Tim Cook said that they were working hard to improve conditions for workers.

'No one in our industry is doing more' to improve the live of employees,' he said, PC Mag reported.

He added: 'We are constantly auditing facilities, going deep into the supply chain, looking for problems, finding problems, and fixing problems, and we report everything because we believe that transparency is so very important in this area.'

However, concerns about the factory remain - and ABC News suggested that managers were warned in advance of their visit.

Last month, 150 Foxconn employees threatened to leap from a three-story building after claiming of poor pay and pressurised working conditions.

Nightline - iFactory: Inside Apple screens on ABC tomorrow at 11.35pm ET/PT

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Inside Apple's Chinese 'sweatshop' factory where workers are paid just £1.12 per hour to produce iPhones and iPads for the West

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Factories covered in suicide nets to stop workers leaping to their deaths 18 people have killed themselves at the facility iPhone, iPad and MacBook assembled in factory in Shenzhen Microsoft, Dell and Hewlett Packard products also built on site Apple have opened the doors to their Chinese 'sweatshop' factories where employees are paid as little as £1.12 an hour.

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? November 25, 2016

Has the information been revised or updated? No

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? current

Are the links functional? yes

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? Yes

Who is the intended audience? Anyone wondering about the conditions of workers who make toys

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? Yes

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor?  Child Labor Watch

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? China Labor Watch (CLW) is an independent not-for-profit

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? collaborated with unions, labor organizations, and the media to conduct in-depth assessments of factories in China that produce toys, bikes, shoes, furniture, clothing, and electronics for some of the largest multinational brand companies

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? yes

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org yes

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? assessments of the factories

Is the information supported by evidence? yes

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? no

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? yes

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? no

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? no

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? to inform

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? fact

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? impartial

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? no

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combine will (dongguan) industrial company

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An Investigation into Four Toy Sweatshops

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The world of toys is a heaven for children, but may be a world of misery for toy factory workers. Wo

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? This was published or posted on December 12, 2016

Has the information been revised or updated?  It was revised then but since has not been updated.

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic?  The information is current for my topic.

Are the links functional? Yes they are functional.

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? Yes it relates to my topi and answer.

Who is the intended audience? The intended audience are those who can make a difference.

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? Very appropriate

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? Yes I have looked at different sites

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor?  Olivia Lambert, News.com.au,China Labour Watch

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? She is affiliated with the Border Mail and NSW-Victorian border.

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? She has done extensive reasearch and has even asked some of the workers questions on the topic.

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? There is publisher contact info.

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org  Yes it is .com.

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? The info comes from china.

Is the information supported by evidence?  The evidence is proven in pictures.

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? The information is reviewed.

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? Yes I can verify this info.

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion?  It is not totally biased or free of emotion.

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? No
Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? The purpose of the article is to inform.

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? Yes

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? The information is fact.

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? objective

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? There is a personal bias considering it is such a harsh topic.

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Millions of internal migrant workers in China do not receive any state protection

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? FRIDAY, 23 SEPTEMBER 2017

Has the information been revised or updated? YES WEDNESDAY, 12 OCTOBER

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? IT IS CURENT TO MY TOPIC

Are the links functional? YES

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? YES

Who is the intended audience? THE PEOPLE WHO CAN EFFECT CHANGE

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? YES

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? YES

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? JANE CAI, SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST , INVESTIGATIONS DONE ON THE MATTER

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? YES SHE APART OF THE BEIJEING BUREAU CHEIF FOR THE SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic?  SHE HAS BEEN COVERING THE ECONOMIC,FINANCIAL, BUSINESS AND POLITICAL NEWS SINCE 2000.

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? YES, EMAIL

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source?

examples: .com .edu .gov .org  YES .COM

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from? IT COMES FROM INVESTIGATIONS, PROVEN STUDIES AND ASKING THE WORKERS.

Is the information supported by evidence? YES

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? YES

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? YES YOU CAN VERIFY THE INFO THER WERE EVEN PICTURES GIVEN

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? YES

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? NO

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? TO PERSUADE AND INFORM THE AUDIENCE ABOUT THW SITUATIONS THAT ARE OCCURING WITHIN SWEATSHOPS.

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? YES

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? IT IS MAINLY FACT

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? IT IS IMPARTIAL ON THE PART OF THE WORKERS.

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? THERE IS A CULTURAL BIAS.

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China swaps sweatshops for smart tech in bid to reclaim lost ground

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A young woman walks into a booth and removes her outerwear. Six seconds later, a software programme linked to a scanner that plots 600 points displays her bust, waist and hip measurements on a...

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? TUESDAY,22 NOVEMBER 2016

Has the information been revised or updated? NOT THAT I AM AWARE OF.

Is the information current or out-of date for your topic? YES IT IS CURRENT.

Are the links functional? YES

Relevance:The importance of the information for your needs.

Does the information relate to your topic or answer your question? YES

Who is the intended audience? THE INTENDED AUDIENCE IS FOR THE PEOPLE THAT CARE ABOUT THE WELL BEING OF OTHERS.

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? YES

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? YES A WIDE VARIETY.

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? MANDY ZOU,SOUTH CHINA MORNING POST.

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? NO SHE IS A NEW AUTHOR FOR THE POST.

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? SHE IS A NEW AND ASPIRING AUTHOR FOR THE COMPANY

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? YES

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source? YES .COM

examples: .com .edu .gov .org

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from?  IT COMES FROM INVESTIGATIONS AND SPOKEN TESTIMONIES

Is the information supported by evidence? YES

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? NO

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? YES

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? NO

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? NO

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? TO TEACH AND INFORM

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? YES

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? PROPAGANDA

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? IMPARTIAL

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? CULTURAL BIAS

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Under 16 and working 16 hours a day ... Chinese clothes factories import cheap child labour from across China

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Children forced to work 28 days a month, don't get paid until end of year and are beaten when they misbehave

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Currency: The timeliness of the information.

When was the information published or posted? November 22, 2016

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Who is the intended audience? The audience is the world or anyone that can help the situation.

Is the information at an appropriate level (i.e. not too elementary or advanced for your needs)? Yes

Have you looked at a variety of sources before determining this is one you will use? Yes

Authority: The source of the information.

Who is the author/publisher/source/sponsor? Elizabeth Segran,Fast Company,

Are the author's credentials or organizational affiliations given? If yes, what are they? A staff writer for Fast Company

What are the author's qualifications to write on the topic? Yes PhD in Journalism

Is there contact information, such as a publisher or e-mail address? Yes

Does the URL reveal anything about the author or source? Yes .com

examples: .com .edu .gov .org

Accuracy: The reliability, truthfulness, and correctness of the informational content.

Where does the information come from?  The information comes from prior research and investigations that have taken place.

Is the information supported by evidence? Yes

Has the information been reviewed or refereed? Yes

Can you verify any of the information in another source or from personal knowledge? Yes

Does the language or tone seem biased and free of emotion? No

Are there obvious errors (spelling, grammar, etc.)? No

Purpose: The reason the information exists.

What is the purpose of the information? to inform? teach? sell? entertain? persuade? To inform the audience.

Do the authors/sponsors make their intentions or purpose clear? YES

Is the information fact? opinion? propaganda? IT IS FACT

Does the point of view appear objective and impartial? IT IS OBJECTIVE

Are there political, ideological, cultural, religious, institutional, or personal biases? THERE IS A IDEOLOGICAL BIAS

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Les Lunes, a fashion label headquartered in Paris and San Francisco, makes its clothes in a factory in the Qingpu district, on the outskirts of Shanghai. If you happen to drop in on any given weekday, you might find the seamstresses' children playing in a little nursery set up for them. At lunchtime, workers gather in a sunlit room to eat and chat. Many are close friends, having worked in this factory together for decades. They visit each others' families during Chinese New Year. When someone is out sick, coworkers stop by that person's home with hot food. It's a world away from the typical image-and reality-of factory life in China.

"Unlike other parts in China, where workers migrate from other cities to work in factories, all 50 of our employees come from the village where our factory is located," says Anna Lecat, Les Lunes's founder and CEO. Lecat says she checked retention rates and spoke with employees before working with this particular facility. "I know the workers' spouses and children. This is a community where people are looking out for one another," she says.

Every few months, a new scandal about the bleak working conditions in the Chinese manufacturing industry makes headlines. Foxconn, the Taiwanese company with industrial parks across China, Asia, and Europe that manufactures products for companies like Apple, Hewlett-Packard, and Dell, has become shorthand for the long and grueling hours of modern Chinese factory work, in part because of a spate of suicides at its Shenzhen factories. Just last month, the Washington Post revealed that the factory making Ivanka Trump's clothing line compels employees to work 57 hours weekly, for just $62 a week, near or below China's minimum wage.

But Lecat is adamant about showing that this isn't the only reality inside Chinese factories. After more than two decades inside manufacturing facilities all over the country, Lecat is keen to change the perception that "Made in China" inevitably translates to poorly treated workers and poor-quality products. And she's not alone. A spate of Western fashion startups that focus on ethical manufacturing-including Grana, Ellie Kai, Everlane, and Caraa -are now shedding light on a new generation of Chinese factories that pay workers fairly, offer pleasant working conditions and reasonable hours, and produce beautifully crafted clothes, shoes, and accessories.

American consumers are increasingly conscious about where their clothing is made and how workers were treated in the process. According to Marshal Cohen, a retail analyst at the NPD Group, shoppers will pay a 10 to 15 percent premium for clothes that were made ethically. Over the last few years, a number of fashion startups have chosen to make their products in the U.S. to offer customers more transparency. It's a move that dovetails with a larger effort to keep manufacturing back home, amid populist sentiment-exemplified in Brexit and the U.S. election-driven in part by a growing frustration over the loss of manufacturing jobs to overseas workers. Still, as market economics (think of the prices that consumers are willing to pay for their clothes) keep most manufacturing overseas, some companies are making the case that Chinese factories aren't so bad, and that "made in China" shouldn't imply "low-quality" or "sweatshop."

Understanding the manufacturing system, and helping to nudge it forward, is far easier when you're immersed and speak the language, says Lecat. Though originally from the Ukraine, she's made China her adopted home. She first started learning Mandarin in university in the late '90s and for the last 32 years, her life has involved traveling between Shanghai, Hong Kong, and the U.S. "If you were to talk to me over the phone, you wouldn't be able to tell I wasn't Chinese," she says. "Learning Mandarin was my ticket out of the Ukraine."

It was also her ticket into the growing world of China's smaller, more expert factories. In 2000, Lecat founded a company called Streamline Alliance that connects U.S. brands with artisanal factories in China. Five years ago, she launched a new venture: Les Lunes, a fashion brand that creates elegant outfits out of bamboo fabric, often embellished with lace. "Bamboo comes from China, so I didn't see the point of moving production somewhere else if we have highly trained seamstresses making product there," Lecat says.

Over the years, Lecat has always found it easy to locate factories that match her values in Shanghai. She explains that higher-quality manufacturing is sometimes-though not always-tied to better working conditions. In Shanghai, a thriving city, it is harder to find factory workers, so employers must compete for talent: this means offering better salaries and benefits. This leads to lower turnover and, by extension, workers tend to be more experienced at their task. In the case of Les Lunes, this means that the seamstresses are skilled at sewing delicate fabrics and handling complex lacework. "There is a stigma that Chinese manufacturing will inevitably lead to poor quality," she says. "We battle stigma with beauty."

Working conditions in Chinese factories have been on an upward trajectory, according to Keegan Elmer, a labor researcher at the Hong Kong-based China Labor Bulletin, an organization that supports workers' movements in China. But that's not to say they are universally ethical. "One of the problems with assessing the state of the Chinese factory is that things are very uneven," Elmer says. "China has some of the biggest high-tech factories in the world that are the opposite of a sweatshop, but might be right next to factories that pay very low wages and give workers very poor food in the canteen."

Workplace standards can vary by province and region, for instance. Take the Pearl River Delta-home to Shenzhen and Guangzhou, as well as Hong Kong and Macau-which is perhaps the country's best known manufacturing hub. Back in 1980, Beijing designated the region a special economic zone, providing Chinese entrepreneurs tax incentives to set up factories and inviting foreign investment. Companies from around the world saw an opportunity to take advantage of an inexpensive labor force, and many American and European brands began outsourcing their manufacturing to China. These days, the area accounts for only 5% of the country's population, but it produces a quarter of its exports and has attracted more than one trillion dollars in foreign investment over the last four decades.

To keep up with this volume of production, Shenzhen's factory owners depend on the constant flow of workers from nearby regions who leave family farms in search of better opportunities. Most of them work for a short while, then move into the cities in search of higher-paying, less-menial jobs-or else they return to their families with slightly more money in the bank. This culture of short-term migrant workers means that factory owners tend to treat employees as replaceable, so they don't bother investing in good salaries or pleasant workplaces. And without much training or experience, it's no surprise that the products that they make tend to be of poor quality.

Lecat also makes the case that shoddy manufacturing is what some brands are looking for. "That's what demanded by their buyers," Lecat says. "Some companies demand planned obsolesce from a factory. They say, 'Sell me something for one dollar that will break in one year, so my customers come back to replace that product.'" Fast-fashion conglomerates and large discount stores, which have strong buying power, are particularly guilty of this approach, and are able to dictate low prices for these low-quality goods.

But even in Shenzhen, the culture in apparel factories is beginning to change. Many workplaces have become cleaner, safer, and more professional. The work itself tends to be less strenuous and workers tend to work fewer hours. After years of strikes-and after three decades of the one-child policy have limited the size of the working-age population-migrant workers have seen their bargaining power grow slightly, as a better educated and more assertive generation has entered the labor force.

According to Benjamin Cavender, a principal at the China Market Research Group, which advises brands doing business in China, factories are also increasingly automating their production lines, which means fewer labor-intensive tasks for workers. "The market was fairly low-tech, run by small operators," he explains. "There's been a hell of a lot of consolidation over the last couple of years. Since most of the smaller factories did not have the margins or the cash to be able to update their operations, they've closed down."

Big international brands are also increasingly applying pressure to factories they partner with to make their buildings more environmentally sound and to ensure workers are treated fairly. "There's been a push by a lot of the international brands to force the Chinese [manufacturing] companies to clean up their act," Cavender says. "If you're Nike, for example, you don't want to get attacked in the U.S. because consumers are unhappy that you're being unethical about how you source product."

The Chinese government has also taken pains to create stronger protections for workers, including written contracts and compensation upon firing. However, according to Elmer, many factories don't pay workers all the benefits they are legally owed. "There are universal problems even in some of the best factories we see," he says. "In reality, in many cases, these social insurance is underpaid or unpaid. This regularly leads to worker strikes and protests."

Of course, fighting for benefits packages is, in some ways, a sign that things are improving. These days, most workers are fighting for a better quality of life and the right to move up the socio-economic ladder, rather than basic workplace safety. Elmer points out that Chinese workers still can't use working at a factory as a stepping-stone into the middle class. "Wages have been on an upward climb but the cost of living has eaten up all those gains," he says. "After 20 years of industrialization, the average factory worker can't hope to buy their own house and settle down in the city."

When it comes to actual workplace conditions, however, Aaron Luo, the founder of luxury bag brand Caraa, says he's seen drastic improvement over the course of his own lifetime. Luo's family has owned factories to the northeast of Shenzhen since the '80s; 20 years ago, the factory dorms were packed to the gills with workers, but these days, factories generally abide by the rule of having four or fewer workers in each room- generally. "Is China ever going to get to Western standards?" Luo says. "I've already seen factories that are up to par with [U.S.] OSHA standards. Who knows how long it will take for all the other factories to get there, but it's important to note that the government is trying to do something about it."

This kind of progress is one reason why Liz Hostetter was able to find a charming sewing factory in Shenzhen when she launched her women's clothing brand, Ellie Kai, five years ago. Hostetter had been living in Hong Kong since 2008-she'd relocated to accommodate her husband's job-and noticed the thriving tailoring industry in the city. "I'm 5'11" and I couldn't find anything that fit me," she says. "I would actually walk into stores and I'm pretty sure [the salespeople] were giggling at the idea that this Amazon would find anything to wear. But then I discovered the city's tailors."

Hostetter would regularly take a dress silhouette that was in fashion, then ask her favorite tailor to make tweaks to it: add two inches to the hem, make it sleeveless, add a pink trim, and so on. Hostetter wanted to make a similar service available to American consumers. So she founded Ellie Kai, which allows women to pick from a selection of outfits and fabrics, then customize it to suit their tastes. Products arrive at the customer's home three weeks after placing the order.

Since Hong Kong is right next to Shenzhen, Hostetter spent months driving across the border in search of the perfect factory partner. She located a workshop in Shenzhen that ordinarily helps brands create sample garments that will eventually be sent to other factories to be made in bulk. Hostetter carefully explained her business plan to the factory owner, enlisting her to create customized clothes for the American market.

She spent day after day at the factory, working closely with the manager and seamstresses, helping to make the production line as efficient as possible. For instance, if several orders come in for a dress in the same size, workers cut those dresses at the same time and fabric is purchased based on real-time demand to avoid waste. In the process, Hostetter got to see the inside of many local factories, and saw the conditions she wanted to avoid. At the facility she's working with, seamstresses make 50 custom garments a day in a brightly lit, clean, and air-conditioned room and earn a good wage. They work from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., with a two-hour lunch break in the middle.

A year after the business had launched, she and her husband packed up and moved back to their home in Cape Cod. "I would have never thought that one of the more emotional parts about leaving life as an expat was leaving my China team, because I realized we had worked together so closely every day," she says.

Bucking A Global Trend

Unfortunately, the movement toward more ethical factories in China does not signal a global trend. Increasingly, Chinese companies are themselves seeking out cheap labor in other parts of Asia and the rest of the world, perpetuating the standards that once ruled in Shenzhen. The collapse of the Rana factory in Bangladesh in 2013, which killed 1,129 people, was a brutal reminder of how low those standards can be.

"The major factory owners in China that have scale-the big guns-have moved all the low-value manufacturing offshore," Cavender says. "They've started buying factories in Vietnam, India, Malaysia, or Sri Lanka. They're having the cheaper production done there, then reimporting the product back to China to do the high-tech finishing."

In 2010, China was making 42% of apparel exports and 51% of footwear exports around the world, but those figures have been steadily declining. Meanwhile, developing countries in Southeast Asia have seen an uptick in clothing and shoe manufacturing in that same time frame. While China doesn't release data about factory relocations, one study showed that then number of factories owned by Hong Kong companies in the wider Shenzhen region fell by a third to 32,000 in 2013, from a 2006 peak. Many of those moved to lower-wage countries.

Hoping to stem the tide of factory relocations to other parts of Asia, the Chinese government has also started to offer subsidies for companies to move to other regions in China, where wages can be up to 30% cheaper. "Factories use the threat of brands moving overseas to do their manufacturing as a way to wave a flag in front of policy-makers to get more tax cuts or subsidies, or to keep workers' wages lower," says Elmer, the labor researcher. "This has been happening for a long time."

Still, amid the offshoring, a subsection of Chinese factories are steadily establishing a culture of premium workmanship, says Luke Grana, the founder of Grana, a clothing company based in Hong Kong. As he set up his brand-basics made from premium fabrics, shipped around the world within two days-he sent samples off to be made in different factories around Asia. Chinese factories did the finest work. "The manufacturers are very skilled and they've been doing it for a long time," he says.

This is important for Grana, because its entire business is based on offering consumers very high-quality clothing at reasonable prices, much like Everlane. (A silk shirt goes for $49, a cashmere sweater for $99.) Grana purchases linen from the century-old Baird McNutt mill in Ireland, merino wool from the Albini group in Biella, in the Piedmont region of Italy, and poplin from a family-run mill in Avignon, France. He ships these to a pair of factories in Huzhou and Guangdong, not far from Hong Kong, where garment makers know how to cut and sew these expensive materials properly. "They're really experts and skilled technicians," Grana says.

China's expertise comes, of course, at a higher cost. "Our experience is the prices the China factories charge us are creeping up" in comparison to other Asian manufacturing zones, says Grana. "They're getting quite high, especially compared to other nations like Vietnam, Bangladesh, or Cambodia." But for him, the rising costs of manufacturing aren't a deterrent at the moment because the only other places where the quality of garment-making is comparable-Europe and the United States-have significantly higher labor costs. Grana may be well positioned to afford the higher price in China: It just picked up $10 million in Series A funding, on top of a $6 seed round, and is growing at a rate of 15% every month.

Of course, for fast-growing brands like Grana-and its U.S. counterpart Everlane, which also manufactures in China-its calculus of ethics versus cost might change as it scales.

In some ways, the shift in Chinese textile manufacturing reflects a broader change in the market away from low-quality fast fashion. Brands like Zara and H&M, which churn out up-to-the-minute styles at rock-bottom prices, are now in decline. Meanwhile, entrepreneurs like Lecat and Hostetter are garnering attention for opting to create classic garments that are meant to be sustainable-to be both long-lasting and made under quality conditions-and customers are willing to pay a small premium for them. In the process, they're riding a broader trend in Chinese manufacturing, and nudging it along too-one that will change the notion of "made in China."

"I look at this as a global issue rather than one country versus another," says Hostetter, about making clothing in China. "To me, a great job in a safe environment that pays well is just as important in Shenzhen as it is in Western Massachusetts."

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When "Made In China" Means Sustainable, Ethical, And Expert

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Les Lunes, a fashion label headquartered in Paris and San Francisco, makes its clothes in a factory in the Qingpu district, on the outskirts of Shanghai. If you happen to drop in on any given weekday, you might find the seamstresses' children playing in a little nursery set up for them.

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Xiao Fang thinks she's one of the luckier workers making Barbie dolls for the Christmas market at the Mattel toy factory in Chang'an.

True, she says, she works 11-hour days, six days a week, and shares a dormitory with nine other women and gets to see her husband only once a week. She had to leave her three-year-old daughter back home in Sichuan. And there is only a communal bathroom, and if they want hot water they must fetch it from another floor. But at least she has a job, she says. And others have it worse.

Xiao is one of thousands of workers in Chinese factories making some of this year's must-have Christmas toys.

An investigation with the US-based NGO China Labor Watch reveals that toys including Barbie, Thomas the Tank Engine and Hot Wheels were made by staff earning as little as 86p an hour.

Overtime can run to nearly three times the legal limit. In some factories - including one producing Happy Meal toys for McDonald's from the new DreamWorks movie Trolls - that means some are on 12-hour shifts and have to work with hazardous chemicals.

According to China Labor Watch, the world of toys may be heaven for children, but it is a world of misery for toy factory workers.

The group's founder and executive director, Li Qiang, said: "We can't tolerate that children's dreams are based on workers' nightmares, and we must fight against the unfair oppression of workers who manufacture toys."

Undercover investigators infiltrated four factories, and the group shared wage slips and pictures with the Observer to support their findings.

The investigators said that they found workers making toys in factories supplying Disney, Mattel, Fisher-Price and McDonald's who reported having to do more than 100 hours of overtime a month - nearly three times the legal limit in China.

But the toy industry's own watchdog, the ICTI Care Foundation, says it is powerless to stop many Chinese factories breaking the law on overtime.

"The reality is, across the board, most factories, or the vast majority at least, work way beyond legal limits in China, and legal limits are almost universally ignored," said Mark Robertson, ICTI Care's director of communications. "Our position is, we want transparency. We want to know how many hours are worked in the factories, so we can make sure workers are paid for every minute that they work."

Dormitory-style accommodation for workers at the Foshan Nanhai Diecast Company, which makes toys for Mattel. Photograph: Gethin Chamberlain/China Labor Watch

Some of this year's must-have brands were made in the factories visited by the undercover team. At the Foshan Nanhai Diecast Company factory the basic salary for workers was just 86p an hour. Toys photographed inside the factory included Thomas the Tank Engine Minis and Hot Wheels Guardians of the Galaxy, as well as the Cars Piston Cup racing garage and the Fisher-Price Learn with Me Zebra Walker. Fisher-Price is owned by Mattel.

Working all available overtime and with all allowances and deductions applied, a worker takes home far less than the average wage in Chinese cities of £715 a month.

An undercover investigator who joined the company as a worker described having to work with isoamyl acetate - commonly know as banana oil - which can soften and dissolve plastics. The investigator worked on a production line and came into direct contact with the substance, reporting that some workers had complained to management about the strong odour.

Staff also claimed that the company offered prizes for the three most productive workers every day. The prize was a pack of paper towels.

At the Chang'an Toy factory, investigators photographed toys from Mattel's Monster High range of dolls and spoke to workers who said that they made the company's Barbie dolls. A large pink Barbie banner hangs on the outside of the building.

The factory employs about 4,200 people, and workers again claimed they worked more than 100 hours a month overtime at peak periods, starting on a base wage of £1.08 an hour. The basic monthly wage was £188 and the maximum take-home pay after overtime, allowances and deductions was £337.

The investigators said that the average working week was 68.3 hours. Chinese labour law allows a maximum of only 36 overtime hours a month. A worker averaging 68.3 hours a week would be working an average 88 hours of overtime a month - but workers claimed the figure was higher during peak production periods over the summer.

At the Combine Will factory in Dongguang, which employs about 2,700 people, investigators photographed toys being manufactured for McDonald's Happy Meals, including Hello Kitty toys and Trolls pencil toppers based on characters from the DreamWorks film.

The investigators interviewed workers in the cutting section, who said they sometimes clocked up 100 hours of overtime a month. They also found that the inside of the building could get as hot as 31C. Wages started at £1.08 an hour and some workers say they were expected to work with banana oil and isopropyl alcohol, which can cause dizziness and even death in high concentrations. The basic wage for a five-day week was £189 a month, with the upper limit of take-home pay about £337. However, some workers on piece rate were able to earn as much as £482 a month.

In the Shenzhen Wei Lee Fung Plastic Products Co factory, investigators photographed Fisher-Price Imaginext DC Super Friends toys - including Batman - along with Disney Princess dolls and toys from the Fisher-Price Little People range.

The factory employs about 2,000 workers, who reported that they started on a basic wage of £1.16 an hour and claimed they were expected to work more than 100 hours of overtime.

An investigator joining the company undercover was required to sign a statement promising to accept any punishment handed out.

China Labor Watch's Li Qiang accused the toy companies of exploiting Chinese workers. He said: "Workers in toy factories face heavy workloads every day, but only earn an extremely low wage. They have children as well.

"Those who earn high profits from toys have done so by oppressing the interests of workers, and as such their negligence should be subject to public and moral condemnation."

A spokesman for McDonald's said: "As purchasers of toys from Combine Will, we take these allegations very seriously. We are committed to ensuring fair and ethical workplace standards in every corner of our supply chain.

"We are working closely with ICTI Care in its investigation as well as overseeing a thorough review of these allegations, and will swiftly and effectively address any issues that are identified."

A Mattel spokesman said: "Mattel is committed to ensuring every single person making our toys and products is treated fairly, with respect and is able to work in a safe and healthy environment. Our labour standards, environmental, health and safety programmes and oversight processes reflect this commitment, and we stand behind our record of ethical labour practices and environmental stewardship.

"We are devoted to ensuring that our manufacturing facilities throughout the world are safe and ethical places to work, and we reject any suggestion to the contrary."

Disney referred requests for comment to ICTI Care. Its director, Mark Robertson, said the organisation took the accusations "extremely seriously" and promised a "robust investigation". He said standards in the industry were improving and the wellbeing of factory workers was the "core priority".

The Toy Retailers Association said it would work with the industry to tackle the issues raised by the investigation. A spokesman said: "The Toy Retailers Association views the China Labor Watch report with concern, which we know is shared throughout the industry.

"Our members are conscientious retailers who abide by a code of ethics with regard to where and how they purchase toys, which includes compliance with all UK, European and wider standards."

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The grim truth of Chinese factories producing the west's Christmas toys

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Xiao Fang thinks she's one of the luckier workers making Barbie dolls for the Christmas market at the Mattel toy factory in Chang'an. True, she says, she works 11-hour days, six days a week, and shares a dormitory with nine other women and gets to see her husband only once a week.

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"The world of toys is a heaven for children, but may be a world of misery for toy factory workers."

That's how a team of researchers from New York-based China Labor Watch (CLW) summarized findings of a recently released report that outlines working conditions at four toy factories in China's Guangdong Province.

Faced with long shifts and monthly wages of about $300 for 174 hours of work, the Chinese laborers, investigators say, assemble popular brand name products such as Barbie, Thomas the Tank Engine, Hot Wheels and other toys for Mattel, Hasbro, Disney, McDonald's, Wal-Mart and other American companies, often in dangerous working conditions and without workplace training.

"We found that the average working hours in these four factories are 11 hours a day, with more than 50 overtime hours a month, and at half of the factories, overtime hours had reached 100 hours, with the highest at above 130 hours," the report said, based on accounts of investigators who worked undercover on assembly lines in "relatively well managed" factories.

According to Chinese labor law, laborers may not work more than 8 hours a day, although hours may be extended under certain circumstances with provisions for the workers' physical well-being.

"During the 11 hours that workers put in within a day, all they had was a 40-to-60-minutes lunch break," it said. "This is an obvious violation of the right of workers to have adequate rest."

Toy factory managers described in the report routinely asked workers to sign "voluntary overtime agreements," which allowed the factory to violate labor laws and regulations with relative impunity.
Wages too low to live on
However, the vast majority of workers request overtime in order to supplement their basic earnings.

"The wages are too low," 27-year-old worker Li Jintao told VOA. "My monthly salary is 2,500 RMB ($360), but after deductions for social security, I make only a little more than 2,000 RMB ($292) per month."

Although Chinese laws require foreign-invested enterprises to pay social security for workers, the CLW report said "one of the factories followed the provisions strictly."

"One factory did not pay the social insurance or the housing fund for the workers," the report said. "Another paid only a portion to some workers; some factories even forced the workers to sign papers saying that they were willing to give up their right to receive social insurance and housing funds."

Li, who left his home village at 14 to work in the city, says his monthly salary of $292 includes payment for two to three hours of overtime per day. The 2016 minimum wage standard for Dongguan and Foshan, the cities where three of the toy factories are located, is $223 per month. The minimum wage standard for Shenzhen, home to the fourth factory, is $300.

While workers at all four factories earned roughly 5 percent more than the local standard minimum wage, Li said it's still not enough to maintain a reasonable standard of living. He plans to quit his job and return home.
No safety training
The report accused the four factories of negligence in pre-job safety training, and for failure to provide workers with masks, gloves and other safety products.

In the packaging plant of Mattel's Chang'an manufacturing facility, a commonly used toxic solvent - thought to be isoamyl acetate because of its distinctive bananalike odor - was distributed in unlabeled plastic drinking bottles. The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says isoamyl acetate is considered dangerous to life after five hours of exposure at certain concentration levels.

The CLW report said the vast majority of workers live and eat in the factories where they work. Some workers complained about poor-quality canteen food and that their dormitories, which are old and dirty, commonly have hazardous exposed electrical wires.

Like most China-based toy-exporters, all four of the factories investigated were accredited by the International Toy Association (ICTI) and have received certificates from ICTI Care, a decade-old program that aims to raise ethical standards and protect laborers in the global toy manufacturing industry.

Employers: 'conditions better than ever'
"Our project focuses on China," Mark Robertson, a London-based ICTI Care spokesperson, said. "We provide certification for more than 1,200 toy factories. We also work in Vietnam, India and other countries, representing 650,000 workers."

Robertson says the industry's current conditions, from shift duration to workers' pay to health and safety, are better than they have ever been, and that China's ICTI-Care-certified factories are stabilizing hours and increasing wages.

CLW, however, said ICTI standards violate China's own labor provisions.

"(ICTI) is an association backed by Mattel, Disney and Hasbro, which allows factory workers to work 72 hours a week, and even 78 hours while the factory has to fill an order," Li Qiang, CLW's executive director, told VOA.
CLW sees no improvement
"It's not that there's no improvement at all. Some details may have been adjusted, but the overall environment for the toy industry has not improved," added Li, who began investigating southern China's toy factories as an undercover laborer in 1999.

"At that time, we worked more than 10 hours a day, and it was like a prison," he said. "Now workers still work more than 10 hours a day."

CLW researchers say companies that operate the factories are fully capable of raising wages and improving work conditions, but that most companies choose not to address the issues.

At time of publication, Disney, Mattel and Wal-Mart had not responded to VOA's request for comments. However, Disney issued a statement in response to a June survey by CLW.

"These issues have been investigated and resolved," it said. "Disney will continue to encourage and rely on factory owners, business associates and governments to promote safe, inclusive and respectful workplaces where Disney-brand products are made."

An earlier version of this report misspelled the name of ICTI Care spokesperson Mark Robertson, and misstated the number of workers the group represents. VOA regrets the errors.

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голос америки

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Report: Chinese Toymakers Have Miserable Working Conditions, Low Pay

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"The world of toys is a heaven for children, but may be a world of misery for toy factory workers." That's how a team of researchers from New York-based China Labor Watch (CLW) summarized findings of a recently released report that outlines working conditions at four toy factories in China's Guangdong Province.

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Dario Berrebi

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The Taiwan-based Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., (also known by its trading name, Foxconn), has been accused of violating labour rights for many years.They keep their employees in overcrowded dormitories run by military-like security forces. People work excessive hours, often with no compensation for overtime, which the company claims is done voluntarily. Management controls every aspect of workers' lives, interfering with their privacy. The concept of privacy is even an illusion, as up to 24 people share a room in huge blockhouses.

Foxconn employs about 1.2 million workers in China. In Shenzhen and Chengdu, a combined Foxconn workforce of 500,000 provides labour for Apple Inc. Violations against workers have already been widely reported over the last decade. However, in recent years these issues have drawn more attention from international media and human rights organisations as there have been a number of suicides and frequent riots in Chinese Foxconn factories.[1]

After mounting allegations, Foxconn, pressured by their largest clients, has taken steps to audit working conditions in production plants. While raises on 25 percent to a daily wage of over $5 have been promised, reports have surfaced indicating that workers were threatened and ordered only to share certain information, as deemed acceptable by Foxconn. The improvements themselves have also been questioned[2]. It should be noted that the Fair Labor Association (FLA) only inspected three Foxconn factories: two in Shenzhen and one in Chengdu, Sichuan. They reported severe health and safety risks, and excessive hours of overtime without appropriate payments.[3]

Foxconn has been moving its production further north to inland China. There is no indication that similar compensation or improvements to working conditions have taken place in other factories. Nevertheless, human rights organisations have gained insight into the gated Foxconn dormitories and highlighted some daily practices including full control over people's working schedules, as well as their free time. Workers are prohibited from using certain devices, their rooms are raided, and if they are found to have broken any of the strict rules, they have to confess their guilt publicly.[4]

Time off is usually only used for rest as people regularly work shifts of 11 to 13 hours. Working hours are so long that people sleep in the factories when a new product is being released. Additionally, if targets are not met, lunch breaks are also cancelled. Days off are rare and trips home to visit family are only allowed once a year. This is particularly concerning as most of the workers are immigrants from distant provinces. They are usually young people who are not in a strong position to find employment in their home
regions. Some of them are attracted by Foxconn advertising campaigns. The largest group of Foxconn employees is between 18 and 21 years old although incidents of child labour have been observed.

Watch the YouTube video: Those Were the Years, When I Was at Foxconn

As the largest private employer in China, Foxconn holds a position superior to that of local
communities and authorities. Although workers are often exposed to harmful substances without being informed, surrounding areas are also subjected to water and air pollution. This problem is consistent among Foxconn factories worldwide. Disturbing odours which cause immediate respiratory problems and gas leaks have frequently occurred in many locations. [5]

Although local authorities are often attracted to the prospect of opening a large factory providing employment, control over the environmental impact is usually very limited. Once established, it is very difficult to determine the effects on people's health. China's Centre for Legal Assistance to Pollution Victims (CLAPV) set up safety zones for different types of production, however, the regulations have not yet been determined for certain categories. Consequences of such cases have been visible in Taiyuan where inhabitants of villages and settlements around the Foxconn factory are unable to determine the damage the factory may be causing to their health. They do know that there are rising numbers of respiratory disorders which already amount to 70 percent of the illnesses among the villagers.[6]

[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/21/foxconn-suffersninth-sui_n_585325.html

[2] http://sacom.hk/archives/960

[3] http://www.fairlabor.org/report/foxconn-investigation-report

[4] http://somo.nl/news-en/somo-media-coverage/inside-foxconnsfactory-report-exposes-conditions-at-apple-manufacturer

[5] http://goodelectronics.org/news-en/foxconn-plant-in-tamil-nadusouth-india-temporarily-shuts-down-due-to-occupational-healthincident

[6] http://www.chinadialogue.net/article/show/single/en/4921

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Foxconn: Working Conditions in Chinese Factories

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The Taiwan-based Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., (also known by its trading name, Foxconn), has been accused of violating labour rights for many years.They keep their employees in overcrowded dormitories run by military-like security forces. People work excessive hours, often with no compensation for overtime, which the company claims is done voluntarily.