THE workshop on "Trade Union Strategies for Promoting Labour Rights in Export Processing Zones and Factories" was organised by the American Centre for International Labour Solidarity of the AFL-CIO (American Federation of Labour- Congress of Industrial Organisations), in the Autonomous University of Puebla. 51 delegates from 14 countries in Asia, Africa and North and South Americas attended the workshop. The delegates comprised trade union activists, NGO representatives, academics conducting research on export processing zones (EPZs) and activists from student groups campaigning for workers’ rights, besides representatives of the Solidarity Centre and the AFL-CIO.

The workshop discussed the delegates’ experiences in organising the EPZ workers in various countries. It also focussed on the strategies to develop coordination at international level, to effectively resist the onslaught of the multinational corporations (MNCs) against the workers in the EPZs. Simultaneous translation was arranged in the plenary sessions and discussions were held in three groups divided on the basis of language --- Spanish, Portuguese and English. The outcome of group discussions was reported in the plenary and again discussed.

An EPZ can be defined as an industrial zone where special incentives are given to attract foreign investment, and where imported material is processed and exported again.

In most of the developing countries, EPZs were established to promote export-led growth. Many incentives are given to attract investment into the country, like tax holidays, duty-free imports and exports, infrastructural facilities, etc, and exemption from implementation of some labour laws and payment of social security benefits to the workers. As many as 27 million workers are employed in 850 EPZs and factories throughout the world. Around 60 per cent of these workers are women.

Be it India and Sri Lanka in Asia, South Africa and Zimbabwe in Africa, Canada in North America or Mexico, Brazil and other countries in South America, reports from all the countries do indicate that the workers in EPZs are severely exploited by their employers. The latter utilise all the benefits provided by their respective governments and flout even the minimum labour laws that are applicable in the EPZs. The workers have no job security. Hire and fire policy is freely applied. While in some countries, the wages in EPZs are slightly more than those paid outside, in many countries the minimum wages declared by the concerned governments are not paid. A large number of the workers are employed on contract basis. Social welfare benefits like PF, ESI and maternity benefits are not implemented. Only young girls of around 18-22 years are employed and they are not allowed to marry or have children. Sexual harassment and use of abusive language by the supervisors is common. Though labour laws are legally applicable in the EPZs, governments and labour officials are least interested in ensuring their implementation. The zone authorities are more concerned with investments than with the welfare of workers.

In some countries, employers provide boarding. Workers are lodged in these boarding houses and not allowed to meet outsiders. Even minimum amenities like enough water, sanitation, etc, are not provided in these boarding houses, which are ill-ventilated and crowded. Young women, who come mostly from far-off places, are not allowed to freely go outside for marketing, etc.

Trade unions are not tolerated in the EPZs though, legally, unions are not banned. The slightest suspicion of any effort by workers to get organised is met with severe repression. Their jobs are immediately terminated. Employers even resort to physical attacks. As there is fierce competition among the developing countries to attract foreign investment, whenever the workers start getting organised, investors shift their businesses to other countries where labour is cheap and workers are not organised. After liberalisation and increasing competition in the world market, many companies have closed down, resulting in loss of employment to a large number of workers.

Because of the severe repression and restrictive conditions, trade unions find it very difficult to organise the EPZ workers. The group discussions in the workshop revealed that unions resorted to various methods to approach the workers.

1) In Sri Lanka, the Progress Union is organising the EPZ workers. They said their organisers went to the boarding houses in the guise of workers’ relatives or approached them in buses while they were travelling to their work places, and tried to talk to and organise them.

2) In South Africa, various social organisations like the youth and community organisations, the church, etc, were utilised to approach the workers.

3) In Guatemala, the organisers work clandestinely in the beginning, develop cadres and then start raising the demands, after gaining some strength.

4) In Brazil, the safety committees are allowed, and these are utilised to organise the workers.

5) In Dominican Republic, the union approached the women in their residential areas, formed neighbourhood committees and women’s orientation committees, and tried to form unions through these committees.

It was also reported that in some cases, mass lay-offs were avoided, and some dismissed workers were taken back through international pressure by international federations and through solidarity actions in the concerned MNC’s host country, etc.

The workshop felt that better results were obtained when a beginning was made with the felt needs and concerns of the workers; their demands like working conditions, safety and health, maternity benefits, sexual harassment, etc, were focussed and workers were approached where they feel most comfortable and confident.

All the participants in general felt that there was a need to develop coordination at the international level between the trade unions, NGOs and others working among the EPZ workers, in order to effectively counter the offensive of the MNCs. At the same time, it was also recognised that there were some differences among various trade unions and NGOs on certain issues like the inclusion of social clauses in international trade agreements and the use of methods like sanctions, etc. It was agreed that any cooperation and coordination could be based only on mutual respect for the differing viewpoints. The workshop also noted that some NGOs and research institutions collected data with extraneous motives; workers and their unions in several countries are naturally suspicious about the role of these organisations. There was also the problem of language in communication and exchange of information between unions from different countries.

Considering all these limitations, it was agreed that a draft would be prepared with all the information regarding the experiences in different countries, and circulated to all the participants for their comments before finalising it. The Solidarity Centre would review the workshop and discuss the methods to develop coordination. The participants would study the activities of the MNCs operating in their countries in the EPZs, their products, etc, and try to identify the minimum conditions on which to organise struggles. The cultural and legal conditions in each country may be analysed and the kind of initiatives and structures found to be useful may be applied in organising in other countries. The workshop also considered if some big multinational corporations could be targeted for developing a worldwide coordinated struggle, but no decision could be taken on this aspect.