New York Times, April 28, 2000
Making Nike Shoes in Vietnam
By MARK LANDLER
BIEN HOA, Vietnam -- Nguyen Anh Ha has never heard of the trade talks
between Vietnam and the United States. But Mr. Ha, a 26-year-old migrant
from northern Vietnam, knows all too well the fragility of life as a
factory worker in the developing world.
"I have been worried ever since I came here," said Mr. Ha, as he rested
after work in his bare one-room shelter, not far from the sprawling Nike
plant near Ho Chi Minh City where he makes $120-a-pair athletic shoes. "We
keep hearing rumors that they might reduce the number of workers."
Nike executives insist that they have no plans to cut back their work force
in Vietnam, which numbers more than 45,000 at five factories owned and
operated by contractors from South Korea and Taiwan.
Yet they acknowledge that the future here of Nike Inc. has grown cloudier
because of the Hanoi government's reluctance to sign a breakthrough trade
agreement with the United States. The deal, which was agreed to in
principle in July, has stalled since Vietnamese negotiators began quibbling
over various provisions.
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For Mr. Monteiro, who used to work in Nike's product development division,
the delay in the trade deal has been a frustrating introduction to Vietnam.
And it comes as Nike seems finally to have addressed another chronic
problem in its operations here: labor conditions.
Late in 1997, the company was stung by the release of a report that
documented unsafe conditions at one of its biggest plants. The report,
prepared for Nike by the accounting firm Ernst & Young, said the factory,
also situated near Ho Chi Minh City, exposed workers to unacceptably high
levels of toxic chemicals. It said 77 percent of the workers suffered
respiratory problems.
Nike said it had been working to improve conditions in the factory before
the report was publicized. And even the company's critics acknowledge that
conditions have since improved. Dara O'Rourke. an environmental consultant
who helped distribute the report to the news media, was allowed to conduct
a follow-up inspection of the factory, known as Tae Kwang Vina, in March
1999.
"They felt the heat, which has motivated them to do things," said Mr.
O'Rourke, an assistant professor of environmental policy at the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology. "They switched away from the most
toxic compounds. But they continue to work with organic solvents and glues."
Taking a visitor on a tour of Tae Kwang Vina recently, Nike officials
pointed out improvements that had been made since Mr. O'Rourke's
inspection. The factory, owned by a South Korean company, now uses
water-based solvents, as opposed to chemicals, everywhere on its assembly
line. It is introducing water solvents in the stitching area, where the
leather parts of the shoes are pieced together.
Above workers' heads, powerful fans circulated the air, fans that Nike
officials said had been installed since Mr. O'Rourke's visit. In noisy
parts of the factory, a vast majority of workers used rubber earplugs --
addressing another of his worries.
Nike's contractors said they were prodded to improve conditions by the
storm of criticism in the United States. "I had pride in my factory," said
C. T. Park, president of Tae Kwang Vina, which has more than 10,000
workers. "And then suddenly it was the worst factory in the world."
Nike has not been able to fix every problem in what are still monotonous,
taxing jobs that can require handling hazardous material. Mr. Ha and two
other workers in Nike's Chang Shin factory complained of runny noses, which
they said began soon after they started on the job there. Their job is to
press synthetic rubber into a heavy metal cast and heat it to create the
contoured shape of a sole.
"Right now, I have good health," Mr. Ha said. "But in five years, I won't
be able to work at this job anymore. It is too hard. I'll have to look for
lighter work at another factory."
Mr. Ha works eight-hour shifts, six days a week, plus overtime, earning the
equivalent of $50 a month. That is slightly below Nike's average monthly
take-home pay of $55. But the company says this still compares well with
Vietnam's per-capita income of $26 a month.
Labor laws in Vietnam are stricter than in many Asian countries, and Nike
says it complies, or does even better, in every category. For example, the
minimum age in this country for factory workers is 15. In Nike's footwear
factories, workers must be 18; in its garment factories, they can be 16.
Employers cannot demand more than 48 hours a week from workers without
paying overtime. But they can run their factories every day. Even so, Nike
said it ordered its factories to close on Sundays.
Mr. Ha, however, said he had worked in the Chang Shin factory on a few
recent Sundays. After an investigation, Nike confirmed that the plant had
asked workers to do cleaning and maintenance on those days. Looking
perturbed, Mr. Monteiro said he would discourage the practice.
Unlike previous Nike executives in Vietnam, Mr. Monteiro is neither
secretive nor particularly defensive about the company's labor practices.
He says he welcomes inspections of the factories by outside monitors like
Mr. O'Rourke. "We closed down after the controversy," Mr. Monteiro said.
"In retrospect, it was a mistake. But you learn and you move on."
Nike has also learned that there are some battles not worth joining. The
Vietnamese government, for example, is considering whether to reduce the
workweek to 40 hours from 48. The American Chamber of Commerce has urged
Nike, as the largest foreign employer, to lobby against the change. While
Nike holds that a shorter week would hurt Vietnam's competitiveness, it is
saying little in the debate.
"I could never come out in public and ask the Vietnamese government not to
have people work fewer hours," said Chris Helzer, Nike's director of
government affairs. "We'd get strung up."
Besides, with the trade agreement hanging in the balance, Mr. Helzer noted
that there were far worse threats to Vietnam's competitiveness.
Full article at:
http://www.nytimes.com/library/world/asia/042800vietam-nike.html
Louis Proyect
(The Marxism mailing list: http://www.marxmail.org)
