Sweatshops close to home

Think Third World sweatshops and you will probably imagine Cambodia or Bangladesh. But such sweatshops are far closer to New Zealand and they're making clothes for us.

South Pacific garment factories workers get low wages for long hours with poor job security, says Fijian academic Anand Chand.

"From my observation, some garment factories in Fiji are appalling places to work," the University of the South Pacific senior lecturer said in a paper presented to the Asian Regional Congress.

He said workers complained factories were too hot, especially in summer, and bright lighting and poor ventilation intensified the tropical heat.

Most factories were small and overcrowded, with workers sitting about 60cm from each other. Toilet facilities were inadequate, with about four toilets for 500 workers, and access to toilets was restricted.

"Furthermore, there is no job security. ... Garment workers in the South Pacific are at the mercy of their employers, and they could be dismissed at the slightest excuse," said Anand.

A Fijian worker told him: "It all depends on the mood of the boss. Our boss has a bad temper. He gets angry within a second. I have seen him physically assaulting workers and firing them on the spot. We are frightened of him. Every day when I come to work, I am not sure whether I will be here tomorrow."

Workers said they were compelled to do overtime under threat of losing their jobs, frequently verbally abused and subjected to physical abuse, such as their ears being pulled.

Women said they were subjected to physical body checks by male security guards as they left work and sexual harassment.

"The threat of dismissal is used to coerce female workers to give sexual favours," Anand said.

He said export-orientated manufacturing in the South Pacific had been developed on the backs of the workers.

Three South Pacific countries have garment industries. Samoa and American Samoa have one factory each, owned by Chinese and Korean companies respectively.

In Fiji, there are close to 100 garment factories. Ten are New Zealand owned, 37 Fijian owned, 25 Australian owned and 18 Chinese owned.

Anand said New Zealand and Australian garment firms had moved to Fiji because of the rising cost of production at home and because of duty-free agreements.

The Australian and New Zealand-owned factories in Fiji were a bit more liberal than the Fijian-owned factories, but they had adopted the local punitive regime.

He said a few liberal Australian and New Zealand employers had indicated they were aware of the factory conditions but could not do much because the market was price sensitive.

"Liberal employers understand the customer in Western society does not want goods from sweatshops but cannot avoid this because of international competition," Anand said.

"For this reason they are forced to use such exploitative labour practices in order not to be squeezed out of competition by the repressive labour regime in Fiji."