No Suicides Please - We're Doubling Your Wages. Smile!

[ScaredEitherWay]

Foxconn Technology Group — the Taiwanese company that manufactures hardware for Apple, Dell, HP, Nokia and Sony and has been hit by a dozen suicides at its plants this year — is holding rallies at all of its factories to raise morale. The theme? “Treasure Your Life, Love Your Family, Care for Each Other to Build a Wonderful Future.” The impact so far? Check out the picture above.

At the rallies, which are slated to be held at all Foxconn factories, the company announced that it would raise the wages of its troubled workforce, more than doubling pay of its factory workers to $293 per month in the case of the company’s Shenzhen compound where a rally was held yesterday, according to Reuters, where its employees had developed a pronounced habit of killing themselves — ostensibly due to the brutal working conditions and low pay.

In case the rallies, slogans and pay increases don’t raise morale enough to stem the tide of suicides, Foxconn left suicide nets in place at its facilities that are designed to catch workers before they hit the ground, although it removed them from one facility (see update below).

“No matter how hard we try, such things will continue to happen,” is how Louis Woo, assistant to the founder of Foxconn’s parent company Hon Hai Precision Industry explained the situation at its factories, in a statement.

According to the company, “success” is the root of the morale problems it’s trying to excise from its workforce.

“For a long period of time, I think we were kind of blinded by our success,” Woo said. “We were kind of caught by surprise.”

Due to the continued success of its manufacturing business — which helps the world’s top electronics brands inexpensively produce high-end tech products which must typically be replaced every 2-3 years anyway — Foxconn plans to expand its workforce 40 percent, while reducing the number of workers in its Shenzhen industrial park from 470,000 to 300,000 or so over the next five years, perhaps to take pressure off of workers at that plant.

So far this year, 12 Foxconn employees have committed suicide, with the latest occurring on Aug. 4, when a 22-year-old female employee leapt to her death from her company-provided dormitory.

Apple, believed to be Foxconn’s biggest customer, said conditions at Foxconn’s Shenzhen plant were “not a sweatshop” and along with Dell and HP, investigated conditions at its manufacturer’s factories, leading to an earlier pay raise. This latest raise precisely mirrors the recommendation of the China Labor Union Bulletin, which asked Foxconn to pay Shenzhen factory workers at least 2,000 yuan per month (the equivalent of $293), up from 900 yuan.

Regardless, China Labor Bulletin spokesman Geoffrey Crothall was not convinced that the raise and accompanying morale rallies will solve all of the problems of these workers, whose cheap wages and long hours are responsible for much of the electronics used by the rest of the world.

“I don’t think today’s event is going to achieve anything except provide a bit of theater,” said Crothall in a statement. “Basically, what Foxconn needs to do is treat its workers like decent human beings and pay them a decent wage. It’s not rocket science.”

Update: AP Shenzhen reported on the Taipei Times today that these nets had been put in place, but they were installed earlier this year. After the rallies, Foxconn left them up at all of its factories except for its Taiyuan Campus location, said Woo in his phone statement, because more employees there have the support of their friends and family. The nets remain in place at the other facilities.

http://www.wired.com/epicenter/2010/08/foxconn-rallies-workers-installs-suicide-nets/