Passion for better lives in Myanmar

In March, I did a mini-tour of Asia including visits to Myanmar and Vietnam. The programs in both countries were rather similar: meetings with labour ministers, our affiliates and partners, visits to garment factories and press conferences. The schedules were tight, but it was very rewarding.

Just think about my first event in an industrial area near Myanmar’s biggest city Yangon. More than 200 young women and some men gathered in a hall to celebrate the International Women’s Day on 8 March.

It was not possible for us to march because of the 38C heat and strong sunshine. We stayed inside and talked about organizing, building stronger unions, bringing more women into union positions – and about health care and maternity protection.

Fifty years of military regime not only means that there is no civil society or middle class in this country of 50 million people. There is also a lack of hospitals, clinics and knowledge about maternity and health issues. It will take years to build a new Myanmar.

But these smiling, young worker sisters showed so much energy and passion for achieving a better life. They understand that for creating a change, they need to join workers’ forces into unions.

IndustriALL Global Union is supporting organizing, training and union building in Myanmar, together with our partners such as the ITUC, BWI and FES. Since 2012, 1,400 local unions have been set up. But there is still a long way to go.

In December 2014, IndustriALL approved the affiliation of the industrial workers’ and mineworkers’ federations IWFM and MWFM, both members of the CTUM trade union centre led by Maung Maung.

Less than three years ago the unions started from zero, so their growth has been impressive. They see a huge need for training ahead, as there is no experience of bargaining either on the worker side or in company management. The same goes for handling health and safety matters.

But workers are learning quickly. I visited the Japanese-owned Sakura garment factory near Yangon, where 600 mainly female workers toil 60 hours a week, 10 hours a day from Monday to Saturday.

Recently the union committee – women only! – concluded the first ever collective agreement for the factory. They achieved an 18 per cent wage increase bringing the lowest salary to US$ 118 per month. No strike was needed – but all the workers wore red armbands for two weeks as a soft warning.

As foreign investment in industrial production accelerates, the government is busy with new labour laws and deciding on a first-ever minimum wage. I told the labour minister how important it was to set it at a level of a living wage.

The minister knew what I was talking about. Wildcat strikes of impatient factory workers demanding higher wages are spreading. Handling them peacefully will be one of the key tests for the new society.

Jyrki Raina

General Secretary

Kyrgyzstan: Chinese oil company refuses to recognize union

After the management at China Petrol Company Zhongda in Kara-Balta rebuffed workers protests against pay cuts and breaches of labour legislation, workers created a local union affiliated to MMTUK. On 30 December 2014 the local union was registered with the authorities as required by law.

The union members' applications to deduct and transfer their membership fees were given to the company, as well as a letter calling for the start of collective bargaining. However, three months on, the membership fees have not been withheld from workers’ wages and collective bargaining has yet to begin.

Workers now report intimidation from the management, which has since established an alternative union under its own control.

The company’s refusal to recognize the union and the disregard it shows to the union's legitimate demands have worsened the situation at the refinery and increased workers’ dissatisfaction. The employer’s actions violate the labour law and the Constitution of Kyrgyzstan, as well as international law, including International Labour Organization (ILO) Conventions No. 87 and No. 98.

In a letter to Mr Shi Jiang Guo, General Director of the China Petrol Company Zhongda, IndustriALL's general secretary, Jyrki Raina, said:

"IndustriALL Global Union strongly urges your management to stop violating trade union rights and to abide by national and international labour laws. It is also imperative that your mangement recognize the local MMTUK union and start collective bargaining negotiations." 

IndustriALL has also written to the Prime Minister of Kyrgyzstan expressing the hope that the refinery would comply with the ILO Conventions ratified by the country and the legislation of Kyrgyzstan. 

IndustriALL urges its affiliates to support the MMTUK local union by sending protest letters to the employer using the form on the right side of this page.

Building trade unions in Myanmar

Maung Maung is president of the CTUM, to which 50 per cent of the country's unions belong. He spent 24 years in exile before he was allowed to return to Myanmar in 2012. Maung Maung is also a member of the governing board of the International Labour Organization (ILO), as one of 14 representing labour.

There needs to be understanding of industrial relations. You need lots of help raising the awareness and also on developing the skills on organizing and standards regarding health and safety, minimum wage, decent work. So we still have lots of work to to.

Brazilian union secures jobs at Toyota and Ford

The union, affiliated to IndustriALL Global Union through CNM-CUT, signed a deal with Ford on 27 March securing workers’ employment at the firm’s factory in São Bernardo do Campo until 2017.

In addition to job security, the agreement provides wage increases for two years and profit sharing bonuses based on results for three years.

A few days earlier, on 23 March, a similar agreement on protection of employment and sustainable growth was signed by ABC and approved unanimously by the workers at the Toyota’s plant, also in São Bernardo.

The Japanese automaker has announced plans to invest 19 million dollars in modernizing the São Bernardo factory, which opened in 1960 as the first Toyota industrial unit outside Japan.

The company, which currently employs 1,700 workers, produces Toyota exports to the United States for the Corolla and Camry models.

ABC says the company is expected to add some 10 per cent of the production to every unit through the creation of a third shift, and a 14 per cent increase in production to supply parts for the future Toyota plant in Porto Feliz (São Paolo).

With the deal, “Toyota wants to enforce one of its main values as the continuous contribution to the development of economy and society in the countries where the company operates," said Steve St. Angelo president of Toyota of Brazil.

"This agreement comes at a great time for the country in which the automotive industry faces difficulties and many automakers are adopting mechanisms to avoid layoffs," said the president of the Union of the ABC Metalworkers, Rafael Marques.

IndustriALL’s Assistant General Secretary Fernando Lopes said, “We congratulate the ABC Metalworkers’ Union for these big achievements securing jobs for their members in São Bernardo. These agreements are in line with the job protection programme, currently negotiated between our affiliates CNM-CUT, ABC and the government of Brazil, and hopefully when adopted will facilitate the spread of this good practice across all industrial sectors in Brazil.”

Japanese metalworkers secure major wage increase

The Japanese economy has been suffering from deflation and is in a period of uncertainty. The unions believe that increased salaries will contribute to revitalizing the economy. The Japan Council of Metalworkers’ Unions (JCM) represents members of 50 unions at major companies in the automotive, ICT electrical and electronics, machinery, iron and steel, and shipbuilding industries.

In particular, JCM is emphasizing the following achievements.  

In a statement about the results achieved in the 2015 Spring Offensive, JCM declared, “For unions that will elicit replies hereafter as well, we will continue to advance support so that they can soundly win wage increases above the amount secured last year, as has been the case with the responses received thus far.”

IndustriALL calls on Rolls-Royce to reinstate Korean unionists

On 7 January 2015, the Busan National Labour Relations Commission found that Rolls-Royce Marine Korea, which produces winches for ships, had illegally dismissed union members in October 2014.

The company says it sacked the workers, who are affiliated to IndustriALL through the Federation of Korean Metal Workers’ Trade Unions (FKMTU), because of “urgent managerial necessity”.

The Commission found that Rolls-Royce Marine had violated South Korea’s Labour Standards Act, which restricts dismissal for managerial reasons. Therefore, the company is bound to reinstate all the dismissed workers within 30 days after the written judgment.

However, the company has failed to give the workers their jobs back and applied for a retrial at the Central National Labour Relations Commission.

“We will not give up until the company admits their fault and apologizes to the dismissed workers,” said union leader, Ha Young Jae. “We want a victory for our powerless workers.” 

In a letter to Rolls-Royce, IndustriALL general secretary, Jyrki Raina, said:

“We strongly urge you to reinstate right away the dismissed workers, and stop harassing the workers and the union. In addition, we call on the management of Rolls Royce Marine Korea to return to the negotiating table with the union to achieve a fair and just resolution of this conflict as well as create a constructive relationship between labour and management.”

Rolls-Royce Marine Korea Ltd in Busan City is an affiliated company of world-famous engineering business Rolls-Royce, which is headquartered in the UK.

The South Korean company was established in 2000 and had total sales of US$36 million in 2014.

Honduran garment workers under attack

The Petralex garment factory, located in the Buffalo Free Trade Zone on the outskirts of the industrial city of San Pedro Sula, has been an anti-union battleground for the past eight years. 

The latest conflict started on 2 March, when the company began targeting newly elected union officers, offering them up to nearly three times their legal severance pay if they resigned voluntarily – not necessarily an easy decision for workers who earn only a third of what they need to survive. Five leaders from local union Sitrapetralex, which forms part of FITH, refused to accept and were summarily dismissed.  One accepted only after his sister was threatened with the sack.   

At a meeting called by the labour authorities on 24 March, Sitrapetralex and Petralex failed to reach agreement.  This is unsurprising given that the only company representation was a newly appointed lawyer who denied any wrongdoing, claiming that the dismissals were the result of restructuring.

Restructuring is precisely the same excuse given by Petralex on the four other occasions it dismissed entire union executive committees.  In June, July and August 2007 and in January 2008, the company followed the same pattern: the union elects its leaders; the company fires them.

The company has systematically dismissed anyone who might represent a threat to its regime of management-by-terror; 180 union members were dismissed in 2007 and 2008.

In 2012, the Petralex case was considered so serious that it was cited in a Central America Free Trade Agreement complaint lodged by Honduran unions.

A recently released response by a US government report noted that a follow-up investigation by the Honduran authorities had failed to investigate whether the union leaders dismissed in 2007 and 2008 had been reinstated. 

Until now the company has paid a mere US$580 fine for its union-busting activities – a pathetic price to pay for eight years of brutal anti-union repression.

In order to seek justice for the wrongly fired union leaders, IndustriALL is making approaches to the company, to the labour authorities, to the Honduran garment exporters association AHM, as well as to the brands sourcing from the company, which include adidas licensee Outerstuff, Gear for Sports (owned by HBI), the Vanity Fair corporation, and Dallas Cowboys.

Global Labour University launches free online course

The six-week Massive Open Online Course begins on 1 June 2015 and will explain global workers’ rights as well as outline the instruments and strategies that can be used to implement them.

Based on a mix of video lectures, readings, online resources and interviews with activists and labour scholars from around the world, participants will gain both knowledge and practical skills for furthering workers’ rights worldwide.

The course, which brings together labour expertise from around the world, has been jointly developed with Global Labour University’s partner institutions, the Bureau for Workers’ Activities of the International Labour Organization (ILO), and both national and global trade unions.

Participants will gain an insight into the history and concept of global workers’ rights and the institutional structure of the ILO as the key player in setting International Labour Standards. They will also gain an understanding of the concepts behind the fundamental rights of Freedom of Association and Collective Bargaining. 

The course will look at the different approaches for realizing decent work in the informal economy and gain an overview of instruments and initiatives beyond the ILO. 

To find out more and how to enrol click here.

Watch a short trailer for an overview of the course: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8u8dpMVfFh0

Women empowerment in India

After introductions the women used body mapping to identify where they experience pains both from working and looking after families. Among other things women suffer from migraines, headaches due to stress and head loads, shoulder pains from working long hours, elbow pains from cooking and sweeping, pains in the wrists, fingers and joints, knees, ankles and back. Women have poor digestion due to irregular eating and missing meals and urinary infections due to unhygienic toilets. Most women are anaemic because they do not have a proper diet. The spine has to carry heavy loads and bear the burden of housework. Most pains are physical as well as mental stress and strain.

When the women analyzed their workplaces, they realized that many of them do not have suitable toilet facilities. In public companies, for example the steel industry, the toilets were suitable and ventilation and lighting were adequate. On the other hand the other factories did not have toilets for women, the women had to sit on the floor, and workers had to eat their lunch at their places. In the steel industry only men are managers. Permanent workers get a bonus, whereas precarious workers do not even receive 500 rupees. The labour inspectors are bribed to keep them from visiting the factories.

The women from the shipbuilding union in Kolkata explained that previously their situation was miserable, but now since the union intervened it is far better. In the meantime they have central air conditioning, separate kitchen and toilets and restrooms. The keys are kept by the women. Uniforms, safety equipment and safety shoes are of better quality since the union intervened. Since then also they have a separate casualty room for men and women, whereas before the men and women were obliged to rest in the same room. They have a working sexual harassment committee that used to be controlled by management.

One woman from the textile mill explained that the dust is heavy in the weaving operation. Women have no personal protective equipment and no gloves. The toilet is outside. They have no suitable rest area. Their food gets spoiled. The vending area near the factory is unhygienic. The union is fighting for contract workers’ minimum wages. All women are on contract. Cotton and ginning is seasonal work. That is why it is tough to unionize the cotton and ginning workers.

Women from IndustriALL affiliate, the Self Employed Women's Association (SEWA), finish jeans in Gujarat. They do finishing, ironing and packaging. The work is divided into three parts. The women cut the threads. They must stand all day. The roof is made of zinc with poor wiring. The women earn 100 rupees (US$1.6) for eight to nine hours of work. They have no other choice for employment.

Ramuben from SEWA told us that after joining SEWA she gained confidence. “I used to be in purdah, but being in SEWA has helped me and other women be involved.”

The women also work in recycling, sometimes in the downstream of shipbreaking. They remove the plastic parts to be melted down. They have no safety equipment, no medical facilities. Their saris sometimes get caught in the work processes.  Sometimes they lose fingers. The fumes are sometimes unbearable. They have no unionization, no safety. The machines are operated by men, but the women earn more.

The women did a role play which made a certain number of issues clear to them, such as the importance of women’s studies and the role that women and men play in families.

Women and their studies is a hot issue for the time being in India. With the role play the women had to negotiate, but still the father had the last word. The mother is a compromising member of the family and the one who makes sacrifices.

IndustriALL India has a women’s committee. The office is trying to create structures in South Asia. In addition every state should have a coordinator. These initiatives need to be institutionalized, otherwise they are up to leaders’ whims and charity. One of the goals is for the women workers to be leaders. The women at the workshop listened to a session by Asha Sehgal on leadership and concluded that they were all leaders.

The many projects that are going on in South Asia need to have reserved parts for women. The women discussed the planned booklet that will be used for training and propaganda purposes. The content of the booklet needs to be among other things: gender and gender bias, women’s safety and health, sexual harassment, toilets, personal protective equipment for women.

At the workshop the women learned how important it is to have a women’s committee and to develop women’s leadership.

The women created a what’s app group to keep contact. 

Rana Plaza: Countdown to second anniversary begins with compensation fund still US$9 million short

With one month to go before the second anniversary of the Rana Plaza disaster, the three organizations negotiating compensation for its victims, are today jointly launching a countdown campaign to remind consumers, governments and the brands that almost two years on from the garment industry's deadliest disaster, justice has still not been done for the thousands of workers killed and injured.

IndustriALL Global Union, UNI Global Union and the Clean Clothes Campaign are ramping up demands on global brands linked to the disaster to fill an US$8.5million gap in the funding needed to deliver full and fair compensation to each of the over 5,000 individuals with eligible claims.

So far US$21.5 million has been paid into the Rana Plaza Donors Trust Fund through contributions from buyers, the Bangladesh Prime Ministers Fund and other private donors. All contributions are used exclusively to make payments to Rana Plaza victims and their families. It is calculated that at least US$30 million is needed to cover compensation claims. To date claimants have only received a maximum of 70 per cent of what they are owed, with further payments delayed as a result of the failure of brands to pay the US$8.5million needed to complete the scheme.

A number of globally recognized brands, all with links to the Rana Plaza factories, have so far refused to provide adequate payments into the Fund. Amongst the worst offenders is Benetton, who is yet to pay a penny into the Fund. Others, including Walmart, Mango and The Children's Place, are being singled out for making donations that fall far short of expectations. Other companies still to pay the required amount include Lee Cooper, JC Penny, Matalan and Kik.

After several months in which almost no significant donations were received by the Rana Plaza Donors Trust Fund, there are some causes for optimism. In recent weeks a trickle of donations has come into the Fund, reducing the gap by half a million. However a promise by Benetton, made in February, to pay a contribution to the Fund has so far not been honoured and rumours that the Bangladesh Alliance was planning to make a significant donation have to date proven unfounded.

The three organizations are hoping that renewed pressure on brands in the countdown to the anniversary will translate into sufficient contributions to finally meet the full cost of compensation.

IndustriALL Global Union General Secretary Jyrki Raina said, “For an industry that is all about image, the garment brands are taking shockingly long to do the right thing and close one of the most shameful chapters in the history book of the global clothing industry."

"It has been almost two years since this industrial homicide; the victims and their families are owed compensation and the possibility to build a new future.”

UNI Global Union General Secretary Philip Jennings said, “The clock is ticking and we expect to see nothing less than full and generous contributions by April 24th from every brand still to pay.

“Garment industry brands pride themselves on being trend setters and responding to the fast-changing fashion world. In this case the brakes have been firmly slammed on.”

“Every cent of this money will go directly to families who have lost loved ones or to victims no longer able to work. It is the right thing to do.”

Ineke Zeldenrust of the Clean Clothes Campaign said: “The victims of Rana Plaza have had enough of the broken promises and false sympathy of the brands. They want this to be settled now so they can move on with their lives.”

Brands still expected to pay into the fund include:

Benetton (2013 revenue EUR 1.6 billion)

On 24 February 2015 Benetton publically committed to paying compensation before 24 April 2015, but is yet to honour that commitment. The Italian brand says it has appointed an independent third party to advise the company on its payment but has refused to state publically who that third party is. The three organizations question Benetton’s decision to delay its payment further.

The Children's Place (2013 revenue US$1.8 billion)

The U.S. clothing firm initially gave an estimated £450,000 through the charity BRAC US. Campaigners are demanding US$8 million from the company which had a revenue of US$1.8 billion in 2013. The Children’s Place is the subject of a major campaign in the U.S. and received critical press recently when the company had a Rana Plaza survivor arrested during a protest at its headquarters.

Walmart (2014 revenue US$ 485.651 billion)

Walmart, the world’s largest and richest retailer, has paid an estimated US$ 1 million into the fund through the charity BRAC US – a small contribution given Walmart’s size and the total amount required. It has suggested it is ready to make further contributions but is yet to follow through with any payment.

Mango (2013 revenue EUR 1.85 billion)

The Spanish clothing company made a very small donation last year but must commit to paying in full before the two-year anniversary.

IndustriALL, UNI Global Union and the Clean Clothes Campaign believe all brands sourcing clothes from Bangladesh – not only those connected to Rana Plaza – should pay compensation into the fund.

IndustriALL Global Union and UNI Global Union are the two global unions that developed and signed the Bangladesh Accord on Fire and Building Safety in the aftermath of the Rana Plaza tragedy. The two unions and the Clean Clothes Campaign sit on the Accord steering committee. The Bangladesh Accord has been signed by almost 200 global brands, covering around 1,500 factories and two million workers.