Thousands end strike at Nike plant in Vietnam

April 2, 2008 From the Straits Time


HANOI - MORE than 15,000 workers at a Vietnam factory that makes shoes for Nike on Wednesday ended a two-day strike launched to seek better pay, a union official said.

The workers, who went on strike on Monday at the Ching Luh factory in southern Long An province to demand a monthly pay rise of 200,000 dong (S$17.16), agreed to management's offer of 100,000 dong a month, the official said.

The union official, Nguyen Thi Dung, said the workers at the Taiwanese-owned factory needed the extra money 'because of the increase in prices... which has hit people hard recently'.

Strikes are becoming more frequent in communist Vietnam, where consumer prices have risen more than 16 per cent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2008, including for essentials such as the staple food rice.

Nike said the workers at the Ching Luh plant were already being paid more than the government-set minimum wage of between 800,000 dong and one million dong per month for foreign companies in Vietnam.

'We recognise the impact that rising inflation has had on the people of Vietnam,' Nike spokesman Chris Helzer said on Tuesday.

'We strongly support the workers' rights to freedom of association and hope the situation will be resolved quickly and amicably.'

The US sportswear giant said it works with 50 different factories in the country, where about a third of its shoes are produced.

In December, 10,000 workers walked off the job at another Vietnamese plant where goods are made for Nike. -- AFP

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April 14, 2008
Vietnamese workers striking for better pay
Foreign-owned plants hit hardest as number of walkouts grows

By Roger Mitton

IN HANOI - SOME 300 workers walked out of a Singapore-managed factory in central Vietnam last week as wildcat strikes continued to spread in the country.

They claimed their current wage of US$54 (S$73) a month at the CCI electronics plant was not enough to survive on amid surging inflation.

The management offered them US$1 more a month, provided they agreed to obey factory rules and not cause any future disruptions. Dissatisfied with the offer, they stormed out. The factory remains closed.

It is an increasingly common scene repeated in Vietnam as low-income workers refuse
to accept monthly wages that are often less than what managers and their politically connected local partners spend on lunch.

Adding impetus to such perceptions of economic injustice is the fact that inflation in Vietnam has rocketed to levels unseen anywhere else in Asia.

Officially, the inflation rate is around 20 per cent, but it is much higher for essential items needed by most workers. Food costs, for instance, have gone up 30 per cent, and fuel and rents by an even greater amount.

Workers also gripe about enforced overtime, poor quality factory food, lack of employment contracts giving them some security and the absence of protection against workplace hazards.

'If company managers pay the very minimum wage and expect workers to work overtime and give them poor food in the canteen, and sometimes do not pay bonuses, you cannot blame them for going on strike,' said Dr Trinh Duy Luan, director of Hanoi's Institute for Sociology Studies.

There has been an unprecedented number of angry workers walking out on their jobs.

There were more than 500 strikes involving hundreds of thousands of workers last year, but the situation looks set to be much worse this year.

Most strikes have been at foreign-owned plants. Recently, 10,000 staff stormed out of a Hong Kong-owned toy company after getting only US$30 in annual bonus.

Earlier this month, in perhaps the most devastating blow to Vietnam's already tattered image as a stable location for investors, 17,000 workers walked out on their jobs at a factory making shoes for global brand Nike, which has 50 operations in Vietnam.

It was the second major work stoppage to hit Nike in recent months. After failing to get a 22 per cent raise on their US$58 a month salary, some workers were unhappy, and fights broke out.

'The government is to blame for not properly monitoring the labour situation, and for letting inflation rise so much that workers are getting poorer, even if their wages are increased a little,' said Dr Luan.

The communist regime has come under fire for giving priority to managers and for pandering to foreign investors.

Striking workers complain that the government penalises them for fighting for a livable wage, while turning a blind eye as top party officials help smoothen deals for investors and get handsome payoffs in return.

But the government has been reluctant to raise wages, fearing this could put off investors. To deter workers from participating in wildcat strikes, the government has warned that those who do so will have to pay their employers up to three months' salary as compensation.

But this would only exacerbate labour strife, which has already sent shivers of apprehension through the business community, especially foreign-owned companies.

'The growing numbers of strikes may well hurt Vietnam's image and upset potential investors, who might wonder if the labour market and the country as a whole is not so stable after all,' warned Dr Nguyen Quang A, director of Hanoi's Institute for Development Studies.
rogermitton@hotmail.com

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April 23

4,000 workers go on strike in southern Vietnam

HANOI - MORE than 4,000 workers walked off the job at a privately owned shoe factory in Ho Chi Minh City, demanding higher pay to keep pace with rising inflation, a company official said on Wednesday.

Workers first stopped working last week at the factory in Vietnam's largest city to ask for an increase in their average monthly salary of 850,000 Vietnamese dong (S$71), said Nguyen Quang Hung, human resource manager of Hue Phong Footwear.

The company agreed to increase their salary 38 per cent to 1,170,000 Vietnamese dong. That's about 75 per cent higher than the minimum wage for workers at Vietnamese-owned firms.


But the workers then demanded to be fully paid for the five days they were on strike, Mr Hung said.

'We understand that inflation has soared. That was why we agreed on the increase,' he said. 'But we can only provide them a certain amount for food for the five days they did not work.'
Hue Phong has been operating in Ho Chi Minh City since 1994. It currently employs about 6,000 workers. The company produces shoes for export to Europe and elsewhere in Asia.


Consumer prices in Vietnam are 19 per cent higher than they were a year ago, according to government figures. A wave of strikes has hit companies across the country over the past few years. -- AP

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Do you think that there are other ways for workers to demand for better pay?

Should company pay worker more? How much more?

Are the TNC exploiting the workers?

Foreign investment in US: Boon and bane

(Dear friends, I feel that you all are ready to take on the BIG FISH based on the quality of comments you have posted. They are very good. Chew on this. Enjoy. It is an article from the New York Times)

April 8, 2008, New York Time

Globalisation can save or kill local economy, as the experience of two cities shows

HOLLAND (MICHIGAN) - FOUR years ago, a low-slung factory on the fringes of town here was stagnating and shedding workers. Then German industrial giant Siemens bought the plant and folded it into a global enterprise. Today, the factory is shipping wastewater treatment equipment to Asia and the Middle East and employing twice as many workers as before.

'Globalisation has been good for Holland,' said Mr David Spyker, vice-president of Siemens.
But about 100km to the north- east, in the same state, such talk provokes contemptuous snickers.

Two years have passed since a Swedish multinational shut down what had been the largest refrigerator factory in the United States, a sprawling complex along the Flat River in Greenville.
The company, Electrolux, sent production to Mexico, eliminating 2,700 jobs from a town of 8,000 people.

'Everybody talks about Electrolux around here the way the rest of the country talks about (Hurricane) Katrina,' said Ms Becky Gebhart, manager of a non-profit medical clinic.
As foreign buyers descend upon the US, capturing widening parcels of the industrial landscape and putting millions of Americans to work for new owners, these two cities offer sharply competing narratives for a nation still uneasy about being on the selling end of the global economy.

And with the US dollar losing much value in recent years, the pace is picking up again, as some of the country's most valuable assets go on the block at bargain-basement prices.

For many communities, like Holland, Michigan, the consequences include new jobs at decent pay, fresh capital to finance expansion, as well as links to markets around the globe.

Yet many others, like Greenville, are suffering from being branded redundant by huge enterprises.

To travel through Michigan today is to experience America's often ambivalent relationship with the global economy.

Foreign capital is putting more American businesses in the control of major enterprises based in Europe or Asia. It is also creating jobs, some of them in emerging areas such as alternative energy, where prospects for expansion may be greatest. And it is aiding the growth of American exports, a source of vigour in an economy hobbled by a collapsing housing market. More than 200,000 Michigan residents worked for subsidiaries of foreign companies as of 2005, according to government data.

Yet in a state that has lost 300,000 manufacturing jobs since 2000, foreign investment has not been enough to compensate; indeed, it has sometimes exacerbated the erosion. In Greenville, on the other hand, state governor Jennifer Granholm was bitterly disappointed by Electrolux's decision to close shop. She had promised to persuade the company to stay, assembling a package of more than US$120 million (S$166 million) in state and local tax credits. The city also offered to build a new plant. Yet the company told her it could not compare with the low wages in Mexico. And as unemployment benefits expire, many of the city's former workers are still seeking their next job.

Despite the bitterness, Ms Granholm has travelled to Japan and Europe in pursuit of expanded trade and foreign capital. 'We don't want to just be victims of the global economy,' she said. 'Pursuing international investment is one strategy to get jobs.'

Greenville, meanwhile, has gained one new industrial operation in United Solar Ovonic, a maker of solar panels. About a quarter of its 200 workers are former Electrolux people. Most are earning about US$14 an hour, less than what they made at Electrolux, but in an emerging industry and with a profit-sharing plan.

'I consider this my window of opportunity,' said Ms Hope Conley, a former Electrolux worker, as she inspected freshly produced solar panels. 'Instead of making products that are going in the landfill, we're doing something for the world. I mean, the world needs refrigerators, but we need to get off that fossil fuel too.'

For Greenville's city manager, Mr George Bosanic, the plant epitomises the future he seeks as he courts new investment. A Swedish company may have broken Greenville's heart, but he is eager for more foreign capital. 'We know this is a global economy and companies are going to come and go,' he said. 'It's a matter of taking advantage of what opportunities there are.

NEW YORK TIMES

1. Do you think that as Singapore embarks on the road to globalisation, will she experience similar problems of these two cities?

2. What can Singapore do to prepare for globalisation?

3. In the long run, will globalisation brings more or less problems?

Background Reading 6:Vietnam War

Dear students,
Great job with the background reading and the comments that you have posted.

Please go to this link and read about the Vietnam.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/
This site have great pic and there are less words


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vietnam_War
This is more text based

http://www.electionworld.org/history/vietnam.htm
This is an even short history of the Vietnam War.


For those who are interested. do a research on The My Lai Massacre


Mrs Selva will be our resource person who will conduct a session on the Vietnam War.

But it will not be the usual lecture style.

Please post questions that you have after reading about the Vietnam war in the comment box.

We will present these questions for her to answer.

The quality of your answer will determine the quality of your thinking

To: Mrs. Frances Ess
These are some questions that I wondered these few days after going through the GP Programme

Social Studies: Globalisation
Isn't globalisation and urbanisation actually westernisation? Countries are actually adopting western style of life in order to globalised, does that mean that in order to be effective, developing western style is the only way?

Social Studies:
Means Testings
What about the case of people who are inevitably unemployed (the disabled, mentally ill, children etc). The government considered only personal income and not family ones, so which case are they considered in? Do they still get subsides? Is it fair to put them in that category?

Geography: Development
Why is Bhutan using Gross National Happiness which was implemented by crowned prince Jigme to assess people's overall needs? What type of indicator is it for standard of living or quality of life or income? Is it effective as an indicator in that way? Why?

The Global Partnership @ Mayflower blog had been a medium in which I had gained many perceptions and facts from each student's contributions from their personal research. It had reached the status of being like a forum, an information hub.

I'm glad about it and hope that it could improve even further.

However, I'd like to say I hope there would be more questions posted in the global partnership at mayflower blog as it seemed that many had posted on the same question and there had been many cases where students had given the same point but just using different statistics and many people replying to the same questions.

Because of that I find that its hard to choose a question to answer due to those question being repeatedly touched and it that many of the points had been said leaving little or none for me to write about it and also give each students its uniqueness for each post.

Dear Chaiyakorn
Thank you for the feedback and the questions that you have raised. We will do our best to upload more questions and reading materials as the days go by.

Food for thought
Globalisation--- Westernisation--- Yes that is why some NGO are against it. I will look out for more reading materials on this aspect for you.

Mean testing --- You can actually provide feedback for the government. I like the questions that you have raised.

As for Bhutan, I really do not have answer to the questions you have raised. May be this wil be a great opportunity fo ryou to answer these questions.

I am glad that you are taking an active role and "plugging into " this programme. The GP Programme depends on the active participation of all studnets.

I am looking forward to the time when you can ask the expert questions face to face.

Environmental Consequences.

Here is an extract from this website about Agent Orange.


http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/1883-cn.htm

In 1961, US President John Kennedy ordered the use of defoliants to deny Communist forces food supplies and routes into South Vietnam. For the next 10 years, herbicides were massively sprayed throughout the countryside below the 17th parallel.
Under 'Ranch Hand Operation', the US army sprayed some 72 million litres of herbicides to clear campsites and defoliate forests to deny cover to the enemy.

Agent Orange was the herbicide used in greatest volume. An estimated 170 kilogrammes of dioxin was sprayed over 10% of South Vietnam's territory. More than two million hectares of inland mangrove forest and agricultural land were affected by the spraying, Vietnamese experts indicate.

.....But it was only in October 1980 that Vietnam created the National Committee for investigation of the consequences of the chemicals used during the Vietnam War.
Hoang Dinh Cau, head of what is commonly called the '10-80 Committee', has said Vietnam will need at least a century to overcome the consequences of Agent Orange spraying.
Its studies have shown high rates of reproductive abnormalities, such as miscarriages, premature and still births, in the sprayed areas.


Read about the reaction of some of the victims of Agent of Orange

http://www.twnside.org.sg/title/2113.htm

GP@Mayflower

GP Programme Module

Introduction
Students who are participating in the GP Programme to Vietnam 2008 will have to read the reading materials and attend the 3 modules before they start their field trips.

Reading Activities.
1. Look at the archives on the right hand side of this blog.
2. You have to read the newspaper articles and answer the questions posted at the end of each article.
3. Post your answers in the comments entry. Remember to write your name and class.
4. Each student is expected to post at least three comments in this blog for this particular activity.
5. You have two weeks to complete this activity.


GP Module
Each Module is one hour long and students will be expected to be engaged in the activities designed for them. These modules will be conducted four weeks before the trip commence.

Pre-field expeditions

1. Bilateral Studies Module (Engaging Mind)
a. History of the Vietnam War
b. Social-cultural background of Vietnam


2. Global Citizenship Module (Working Hands)
a. Case study of Vietnam-Singapore Industrial Park.
b. Singapore Brand – Honesty, Transparency and Efficiency
c. Attributes and concepts of a Singaporean Global citizen

3. Community Involvement Partnership CIP (Touching Heart)
a. Spirit of Servant Leadership
b. Spirit of Sustain Philanthropy
c. Spirit of Service Learning
d. Protocol and SOP for CIP



Field Expedition

1. Entrepreneurship Module (Engaging Mind)
a. Students will have to activate their business plan and sources for materials and goods for their business.
b. They will have to set up a small enterprise when they are back in Singapore.

2. Global Citizenship Module (Working Hands)
a. Students will interact with Singaporean overseas and interview them about being a global citizen

3. Community Involvement Partnership CIP (Touching Heart)
a. Students will carry out the CIP that they have planned using the tri-spirit philosophy of Servant Leadership, Sustain Philanthropy and Service Learning



Post Field Expedition
Key Performance Indicator

1. Global Citizenship Module (Working Hands)
a. Students to produce a newspaper article on the Global Singaporean

2. Community Involvement Partnership CIP (Touching Heart)
a. Students to share with the school during two care talk their experience with CIP

Conclusion
The Globalisation Partnership Programme will prepare our students to function in the 21st century: rooted in Singapore yet have wings to fly.

The countries selected for the GP programme will depend on the economic condition, political stability and social tone of the country.

Therefore country may change fromm year to year, but the GP programme will be used to prepare the students for globalized world.