Ethiopia puts good conditions in factories for brands like H & M and Calvin Klein, but workers get rid of their money at $ 1 a day

The widely acclaimed man as the architect of Ethiopia 's new industrialization program, prime adviser to the Prime Minister, Arkebe Oqubay, urged workers not to be safe. to dwell on their low wages, but to see the situation as a whole. "We should not focus on things present, we should think about the future," he said during a speech in a workshop at the opening of the park, according to a worker who participated in the inauguration

. a modest but significant step towards this future and towards Ethiopia's ultimate goal of becoming a lower middle-income country by 2025. To this end, amid strikes in clothing factories in Bangladesh and rising wages in China and Vietnam, Ethiopia as a new world hub for fast-fashion production

On the private sector side, PVH led the campaign to bring garment sector in Ethiopia. In 2014, the company conducted a survey of several African countries to determine which would be most suitable for the ready-to-wear industry. Ethiopia has outstripped Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Zambia and Uganda, largely because of the responsiveness of some people to the government, as well as access to the country. Ethiopia's low-cost renewable energy sector and, perhaps most importantly, its cheap labor force. While their study showed that productivity was higher in Kenya, while the workforce was more industrialized, HPV chose Ethiopia, where labor costs were higher. low and the government's commitment more obvious. (PVH has not responded to requests for comment.) The government plans to build 17 industrial parks across the country, some of which should even employ 30,000 refugees of nearly one million people, including the Ethiopia is the host.

Not a living wage

Clean and safe housekeeping environment and the importance given to the sustainability of the park – which Ethiopia has has been rightly hailed – may obscure the fact that workers continue to receive poverty wages, as in all other countries where the garment industry has settled.

"There is a shift in the way the industry talks about social and environmental sustainability, and these are different issues," says Jennifer Bair, a professor of sociology at the University of Virginia, whose the research focuses on the apparel sector. "We tend to think that businesses that are better citizens in one area are also good citizens in another", despite the fact, she says, that this is often not the case. Sustainable installations can in some cases save companies money in the long run; if, for example, investments in energy efficiency lead to lower production costs. Wages, on the other hand, are simply regarded as a zero-sum relationship between the firm and the worker

In the Hawbada Industrial Park, plant operators earn 750 Ethiopian Birr, about $ 27 a month. On this sum, the workers must pay the rent and the food.

In the Hawbada Industrial Park, factory operators earn 750 Ethiopian birrs, or about $ 27 a month. From this sum, the workers have to pay the rent and the food. They say it's hard to afford soap and coffee on the weekends. Many are forced to ask family members in the countryside to send them money to supplement their income because they can not survive thanks to their factory salary. Everywhere in Hawbada, young women – most of them around the age of 18 – sleep in bare, concrete rooms, sharing two thin mattresses on the floor between four people. They divided the rent cost of $ 36 between them. "My father told me, think of the factory as a way to gain some experience, then come home," says Genet, a garment worker of 20 years with the Sri Lankan-based clothing company Hirdaramani (the names of all workers and former workers have been changed because they fear reprisals from their employers). Her family does not see the factory as a long-term career opportunity because she can not support herself in terms of wages.

To put this in a more comprehensive perspective, the average monthly salary of a garment worker in Vietnam is 136 to 175 dollars; in Sri Lanka it is $ 66; in India it is between 78 and 136 dollars; and in Cambodia, it's $ 170. In Bangladesh, where garment workers have always been paid the lowest wages, the minimum wage for garment workers is $ 65, and the government plans to raise it again. Of course, the cost of living varies in each country, but all have a minimum wage. Ethiopia, on the other hand, does not do it. The international poverty line is $ 1.90 per day, or about $ 57 per month.

When garment workers complain about low wages, as is often the case, drug managers often do not know what they are doing. factory have two answers. The first is to say that workers earn more than 750 birr a month. They argue that if you take into account some "extras", including a monthly food allowance – a meal in kind at work, or enough money to buy a cheap meal at the canteen – and a bonus for the # In addition, the salary is more than 1,100 or 1,200 Birr, or $ 1.33 per day ($ 40 per month). They say that such "extras" are not offered to workers in other sectors. However, in Ethiopia, other low-wage jobs sometimes have such informal benefits. Domestic workers, for example, receive an average of 1,200 Birr a month, but food and shelter are usually included. In addition, when The Intercept examined the bank accounts of certain workers, the monthly amount deposited ranged from 577 birr ($ 19) to 828 birr ($ 30). Workers, most of whom have never had a bank account before and whose financial literacy is weak, have not been able to explain these differences.

Factory managers also say that wages are low in Ethiopia because productivity is low. change as productivity increases. But David Muller, director of human capital management at TAL Apparel, a Hong Kong-based park company, explained that the base salary of 750 birr is indexed at an efficiency rate of 60%. factory managers thought they would be affected in six months. However, he says he is now waiting for workers to reach 60% in two or three years, which means that their wages should not increase significantly by that time. Meanwhile, when workers ask for wage increases as their productivity increases, Muller says he has the following answer: "I pay you 60% [efficiency] so I'll reduce [your salary] to 30% because you do not gives that 30% [efficiency]? Am I going to take it back from you?

Doug Miller, a professor of fashionable worker rights at the Northumbria School of Design, who has studied the industry for 30 years, says, "It's a scandalous way to calculate He added "If you look at the minimum wage fixing convention [de[International Labor Organization]their whole approach is based on what the workers need to live, not on their efficiency."

The efficiency figures are calculated using an internationally recognized metric known as Standard Standard Minutes. But Miller says that he has never seen it used to calculate wages this way, since most countries, unlike Ethiopia, have a minimum wage that is taken into account to set workers' wages.

From one point of view, an increase in productivity actually results in wage increases. Miller noted that if workers receive more money because of improved efficiency, this could result in some kind of productivity bonus, but more often, companies simply pocket the additional benefits.

H & M launches campaign to pay workers. "A decent wage by 2018" … but would not provide a specific amount for Ethiopia

"In theory, wages should increase when productivity increases, but it is not not sure that this is very strong in the global industry, "says Bair, the sociologist. "In China, you have seen wages rise in part because of competition for labor from other industries. By contrast, in Bangladesh, where the garment industry has been practiced for decades, garment workers still earn about the minimum wage. One of the reasons why wages might not increase, says Bair, is that if a country relies heavily on this industry as the main source of export earnings. In the Hawbada Industrial Park, companies collectively determine workers' wages, so that competition for labor is not possible, at least in the park.

Sometimes wages do not increase even if the mark. In 2013, H & M, one of the companies that sourced in the park, launched a campaign to pay workers in the garment industry "a living wage before 2018". H & M sets a living wage that "meets the basic needs of employees and their families, and provides some discretionary income such as savings," but would not provide a specific dollar amount for Ethiopia. Iñigo Sáenz Maestre, press officer at H & M, told The Intercept: "Our goal for 2018 is to create democratically elected worker representative committees and improved payroll systems for suppliers representing 50% of our workforce. volume of products ". "The first milestone in our strategy to reduce fair wages."

Growing Pains

The early days of Hawbada Park have not been easy. In the beginning, workers said that their managers were often aggressive with them. "If anyone made a mistake, they would shout or hit them." The workers were scared and kept silent, "says Aynalem, a former supervisor of Indochina, a clothing company based in China, who resigned because of what she describes as a hostile workplace. "They were expecting me to be aggressive like that." She says that all workers who started at the she did so quit.Adanech, a factory operator at Indochina, says things have changed over time: "Before, they were screaming but recently, a month or two ago they are calmer because the employees leave their jobs and return to their families. "(Indochina did not respond to a request for comment.) The park's business figure over the past year is about 10 to 12% per month and more than 100% over the course of a year.

Belay Tessema, the Ethiopian Investment Director of the Park Commission, says that the difficult work environment has led to strikes. "Once a month, there are strikes and there are three or four companies doing regular strikes," he says. "Strikes happen because of mismanagement and abuse." Tessema attributes many challenges to cultural misunderstandings. "There is a communication gap between expatriate leadership and operators.The leadership style of Asian companies is autocratic.As Ethiopians, we need to be listened to, advised and involved." Human Resources official said the brands have recently started working with a behavioral psychologist from Hawbada University to try to determine the profile of the most likely person to

Most of these young women come from rural areas located miles from Hawbada, and this is the first time that they are moving away from their families.Many have never seen a city or indoor plumbing before arriving at Hawbada, not to mention complicated machines for which they are hired.Some did not grow up in homes with electricity.

"Once a month there is has strikes and i There are three or four companies doing regular strikes. Strikes occur because of mismanagement and abuse.

Workers often live far from the park because they can not afford to buy housing closer to their home. Initially, young women would go to work, sometimes in the dark if they worked a night shift. At first, however, the management realized that they had to provide transportation. "A woman was raped eight or nine months ago," says Genet, who works for Hirdaramani. "After that, they provided the transportation."

Almaz, another Indochina sewing operator, says that the factory bus dropped her at the end of the paved road closest to her home. As soon as her feet reach the dirt road, she runs. The area – a bustling market during the day – was dark and young men from the neighborhood, sometimes drunk, pursued her and another young worker with whom she was, mocking them and calling them "children of China". Recently however, according to the workers who spoke to The Intercept, Indochine changed his hours to a single shift that only works during the day, and no one comes home in the dark. Almaz believes that the factory made the change after a woman she knew was badually badaulted while she was walking the last few minutes on unlit bus trails to her house . Almaz and other workers went to their boss's home to report the incident and demand that something be done. "We gathered because, we said, tomorrow it will happen to us, so we had to do something," she said. Workers at some of the other plants in the park are still walking five to thirty minutes in the dark because buses do not go down on unpaved roads.

Investors and the government hope that the park will eventually employ 60,000 workers. Yet, at present, they have only managed to shelter about a quarter of that number, and already housing prices have skyrocketed. The initial hope of the government was to integrate the workers into the life of the city by housing them among the population – partly to avoid the criticisms faced by other countries where garment workers are housed in unsanitary and overcrowded conditions. To this end, they set up a microcredit system under which local families benefited from a loan that covered 85% of the cost of building a small room in the compound family to rent to the workers. But the program presented unforeseen challenges. In some cases, when the young women resign and return to their families, one of the roommates is left behind, responsible for the entire rent. In at least one case, the family locked up the young woman in the house until the company came and intervened. What will happen next is not clear. While we talk a lot about building dormitories for the workers, neither the government nor the companies seem to want to take responsibility for these dormitories: "Now it's okay because they do not know where the workers live . The minute the housing has a PVH label, it's a problem, "says Girum Abebe, a researcher from the Ethiopian Development Research Institute affiliated with the government. If something goes wrong, neither the government nor the companies want to be blamed.

Residents of the city say that they are up to now disappointed with the returns to the industrial park. Many who expected to see economic recovery when workers moved in say that young women are so poorly paid that they can hardly afford to contribute to the local economy. In fact, they say, all that has happened is that the cost of living has increased for local residents. "It's a burden for the city," says Tedi, who drives a tuk-tuk to Hawbada. "The rent was about 500 birr a month, now, because of the industrial park, it has risen to 1000 birr."

Those who live in and around the city feel that it is about to change. Mohammed Dewiso, 75, is a farmer just outside Hawbada and as the city expands he says he's probably going to lose his land, like farmers whose the government expropriated the land to build the industrial park. "This farm will disappear," he says, "it's inevitable. When you are going to vomit, your teeth are not going to stop it. "He says the compensation that the government could offer is unlikely to be helpful to anyone like him." If the money comes today, it will be finished tomorrow, but this land will support us. "

Hawbada roads are under construction and new buildings are under construction.We are talking about building a bridge over the lake .At the present time, it is necessary to an hour by bus to go from the new Hawbada Airport – built to host the fledgling industry – to the city on a bumpy track that follows the dried riverbeds along the shores of the lake. The contrast between the new Hawbada and the old is striking: donkeys and cows graze between tukel huts, and children run along the sandy shore to the water. Here the end of the year, an asphalt road will be built to get people from the airport to the city ​​in 15 minutes.

Ask More

The Government Has Made Huge efforts to attract foreign investors, but now, businesses are pushing for more.

Inside the industrial parks, there will be no taxes for their first 10 years in Ethiopia. For expatriate employees, no income tax for five years. There is no tax for materials imported for manufacturing, and Ethiopia has virtually no tax on exports. In addition, everything from water pipes and electrical wiring to factory hangars has been provided by the government. "All they had to do was bring their machines in and plug them in," said Fitsum Keltema, the director of the Industrial Parks Development Corporation in Hawbada. And while in the past, foreign companies in Ethiopia complained of a quagmire of bureaucratic procedures, this time the government brought them bureaucracy – financial services, telecommunications, customs and other logistics are all located in an office inside the park. 19659002] In addition, manufactured goods in Ethiopia allow businesses to have privileged access to the North American market under the African Growth and Opportunity Act, which the US Congress renewed in 2015 for 10 years. . the European single market thanks to the Everything but Arms agreement.

Yet, despite these incentives, companies say they should get more. Muller, with TAL Apparel, says the labor costs in Hawbada are very high and the government should step in. "They charge us 1,200 birr ($ 43) [per day] for the rental of the average vehicle. Now, if you consider, these are two girls who work for a whole month to pay for this vehicle. "

Managers also complain about the high cost of living in Hawbada." "Hawbada has become the most expensive city in Ethiopia for basic food varieties, for basic rent," says Muller, adding that the houses they rent cost as much as "we stay at the Hilton hotel in any other country." But expatriate employees like Muller, unlike factory operators, receive a housing allowance as part of their monthly salaries of $ 4,000 to $ 5,000.Some live in apartments in the most luxurious complexes of Hawbada, with access to a pool and spa. are not exempt from tax, but companies are currently lobbying the Ethiopian government for it charges spices and other ingredients tax-free to business leaders.

The role of the state is ambivalent. At times, the government, operating under a state-led development model similar to China, acts as a mediator between business and labor, seeking to ease housing and cultural work place. At other times, they adapt and give back to the companies because they take advantage of their power of claim, implicitly threatening to go elsewhere if the government does not accept them. not.

Government now calls for changes in the country's labor force This code would make it easier for workers to be penalized in case of delay or absenteeism and would significantly reduce benefits such as annual leave and allowances dismissal.

Other countries have decided to designate certain areas such as industrial parks as work areas. does not apply for periods of time, or has declared certain areas as strike-free zones. Although the Ethiopian government has not gone so far, corporate lobbying inside the park could end up affecting labor laws for the country as a whole. For example, at the request of companies, the government is now demanding changes to the country's labor code that would facilitate the penalization of workers in case of delay or absenteeism and significantly reduce benefits such as annual leave and allowances. dismissal. [19659002PendantcetempslessyndicatsnesontpaslesbienvenusdansleparcindustrielC'estunautreexempledanslequellespropriétairesd'usinesontapprisdeleurbadpériencesdansd'autrespays"Lessyndicatspublicspeuventfermerdesindustries"ditMuller"C'estarrivéauSriLankaCrèmeglacéeUnileverferméeTantdebellesorganisationsetusinesontdûfermerparcequelesdemandesétaientélevées"Legouvernementestd'agreement"Lessyndicatsonttendanceàêtrepolitisés"expliqueBelachewFikrevice-commissairedelaCommissionéthiopiennedel'investissementLegouvernementéthiopienaunehistoirederépressionàl'encontredesdirigeantssyndicauxquinesontpasd'accordavecluiLesmembresdesyndicatsindépendantsontfaitfaceàdeslicenciementsduharcèlementetdelatorturepourleursactivitésaufildesans[19659002] Fikre and the companies indicated that the internal advice of the workers could do the work of a union. "When you have a workers council, you have the most important element of a union, which is to have a platform for workers to come together and express common problems," said Fikre

. put pressure on management to get higher wages failed. "We tried informal collective bargaining, but it did not work, they usually tell us: If you do not like it, you can go, there are so many like you who need 39, a job, "says Genet." They do not know what they do, "says Chanyalew Akebe, head of the Ethiopian Confederation of Trade Unions 'section in Hawbada, citing the workers' lack of experience. in industrial jobs and the organization. "The workers' councils, he says, are" not legally registered in accordance with labor legislation "and, therefore, they can not represent workers in court. are also completely voluntary and not all factories have any.

Apart from trade unions, there are hardly any civil society organizations that can lobby for better wages for workers: In 2009, the Ethiopian government has society. This does not bode well for workers who hope to see wage increases because in the absence of competition for the workforce, the other means of pressure are the pressure of society civil.

As everyone who works in the industrial park points out, it is still early. But if McRaith's promise comes true, if the Hawbada Industrial Park shows that there is "no conflict between the successful companies and the companies that are doing the right thing," you have to be aware that new facilities are not brilliant. enough – that, basically, workers also need a fair compensation for their work.

Laura Dean has reported from Ethiopia a fellowship from the International Reporting Project