by GALE RAJ-REICHERT
Workers perform final testing and QA before sending drives off to customers on its 2.5-inch notebook lines, at Seagate Wuxi Factory, China PHOTO/© Robert Scoble
The global electronics industry is one of the largest industrial sectors in the world economy. It makes up close to one-quarter of globally traded manufactured products and is estimated to generate more revenue and employ more workers than any other manufacturing sector. A key feature of the industry is its extensive use of outsourcing by brand firms such as Apple to suppliers, such as Foxconn.
The outsourcing of manufacturing of thousands of parts and components, and the assembly of electronic products, has created vast and complex global supply chains. Many of the largest factories in the electronics industry global supply chain are located in developing countries. Today, China is the world’s largest manufacturer and exporter of electronic products.
Due to extreme price competition amongst suppliers and demanding production cycles, poor working conditions and violations of labour standards and regulations are systemic throughout the global supply chain. They include low wages, overuse of temporary workers, forced labour, excessive working hours, gender discrimination, health and safety risks including chemical poisonings and deaths, and weak or suppressed trade unions and collective bargaining.
These conditions prevent the realisation of decent work in the industry.
Regulation and governance over labour conditions – particularly in factories in developing countries – are often not implemented, effective or sustainable. Developing country governments either lack the resources and capabilities – or political will – to enforce labour regulations amongst firms. This is particularly the case when governments see foreign investments and the participation of suppliers in global supply chains as drivers of economic growth through employment and export earnings.
Private and industry standards such as the Electronics Industry Code of Conduct (EICC), adopted by brands such as Dell, Hewlett-Packard, and Apple and their largest suppliers, are normally not implemented, enforced or monitored. They are also inadequate in identifying labour violations. For example, industry audits of electronic firms in Malaysia failed to expose or help eliminate forced labour in the industry for many years.
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