Expert opinion on possible ways to improve Xiao Deng’s condition (and make Tony’s idea’s work out)
For the past weeks we introduced you to difficulties in the garment factories’ industry, the every day life of a factory worker, Xiao Deng and Tony, a concerned CEO of United Brands for a Responsible Textile Supply chain (UBRTS). The main common problem: violation of labor rights, rules and regulation, lack of training, AND lack of communication channels, etc…. among others.
Helena Perez*, expert in labor rights issues, states that one of the main problems regarding labor rights and Chinese garment factory workers is that sometimes they have no clue about their rights and about grievance methods available for them. As Helena explains:
“If workers don’t know their rights, they cannot actually exercise them. We can for example put in place grievance mechanisms and tell them, you have the right to have your rights respected. But, what are those rights? What does it mean to have the right of not being discriminated? Or to not being sexually harassed. They don’t know the content of those rights, so they cannot complain, they can’t raise their voice and say: “Hey! I am not being respected!” because they don’t know how it should be!”
In order for workers to know about their rights it’s important that they receive training on this. But there are some challenges when it comes to training, like for example lack of financial resources, and the great amount of turnover. Other important challenges are the amount of workers to train and the engagement they exercise during trainings:
“Factories don’t allow you to train only 20 or 30 workers, they will tell you to train 200/300 workers at the same time. So that doesn’t allow you any interaction and it is not participatory. Most workers are used only to listening, not to participate and get involved. But for learning, only when they participate, they get engage, and only when they are engage, they actually learn.”
We’ve been talking a lot about “Training to improve the conditions of the garment factory workers”. But is training alone enough? Helena has a strong opinion about this:
“We have to walk the talk”. It is not enough to tell the workers that they have the right. We have to ensure that we are giving those rights. It is not enough that factories allow you to train the workers, or that they conduct training. They should also have policies and procedures that allow those rights to actually be exercised in practice.”
* Helena Perez is expert on the field of labor rights. Helena is specialized in international labor standards and has over 12 years of experience working with international organizations, NGO’s and multinationals. Her expertise lies in helping the improvement of working conditions in supply chains worldwide by means of training and advice on human resource functions and international labor principles and standards in Asia and Central America. Helena has a vast experience in the field, having trained over 1600 professionals from 140 organizations and in 21 countries.
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28 Jun 2015
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mdanino
IMSD /
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