Revealing Adidas Olympics Quote

The Sydney Morning Herald has the following quote by Ray Tai, an intellectual-property enforcer for Adidas in Asia:

"The Olympics will be the ultimate test when it comes to counterfeit goods. All sponsors of the Games are stepping up their enforcement efforts now-or they should be, because they'll get hit more than nonsponsors, that's for sure. I am very proud to say that, right now, if you go to any large or midsize city in China, you can't find any fake Adidas. We want to keep it that way. Our strategy is to raid wholesalers, or even the retailers. Typically, companies raid the counterfeiting factories. That gets a big splash in the paper, but it's a waste of money. At the factory, shoes may be worth only a few dollars a pair. But at the wholesale and retail levels, they're worth a lot more. That's where you can make a much bigger financial dent. There's an incentive for them not to buy fakes anymore. We ordered more than 1,000 raids last year. We'll probably start seeing Olympic fakes surface six months or so before the Games. We'll be hiring extra security to watch for them. For now, we've found a way to deter the problem. I am a strong believer in prevention. Most lawyers are too bogged down with crime and punishment."

Interesting that adidas can employ an army of IP agents, while simultaneously finding it so difficult to enforce labor standards.

Oregonian Opinion Column on Nike, Funny Quote from Yours Truly

Check out Steve Duin's column appearing tomorrow in The Oregonian. According to Google, Sunday's circulation of The Oregonian is apparently 375,913 readers. I hope lots of them write angry letters and put in annoyed phone calls to Beaverton. The article also mentions former USASer Agatha Schmaedick Tan, who was a great organizer at the University of Oregon, and is an alum I have a ton of respect for. The first two comments are amusing too. I have half a mind to respond pointing out how the Associated Students of the University of Oregon/student activities office have historically banned funding for groups interested in waging USAS campaigns on campus since 2000...

American Association of University Professors Attacks Nike Conflicts of Interest at UWashington

Recently, the University of Washington American Association of University Professors (AAUP) passed a resolution condemning a school provost's appointment to Nike's Corporate Board of Directors. There has been a lot of controversy over Nike at the UW recently, as USAS activists have been trying to get their school to force Nike to fork over roughly $2 million in unpaid severance to Honduran workers. Although the students have successfully lobbied a university committee to recommend putting Nike on notice of violating Washington's lucrative clothing contract, so far UW President Mark Emmert has not listened to his own joint-governance committee. Instead, he sent the company a weakly worded letter which you can view here.

Most of Emmert's letter is fairly weak, asking for the company's "perspective" on the Honduran situation and "information on the remediation" due to workers. But, Emmert doesn't exercise the only leverage he has short of cutting Washington's contract with Nike, which is officially putting the company on "notice" for labor violations. Given this lack of action by the school's president and the provost's newly minted association with the company, concerned faculty seem to have a lot of ground in questioning the integrity of the university's leadership. For more information check out Seattle Weekly and Crosscut coverage of these issues.

Letter from Cambodia: recent Harper's article by Ken Silverstein

As promised, you can read Ken Silverstein's excellent article recently published in Harper's Magazine here. (Please also consider subscribing to Harper's). Silverstein covers a lot of ground, from exposing the FLA as a corporate front, to critiquing the ILO's Better Factories Program, and of course, presenting the cold-hard numbers behind the true costs of producing apparel. At the end of his article, Silverstein uses a mainstream economist as a sort of capitalist Cassandra, who argues that elites should increase garment workers' share of corporate profits, in order to generate a new source of global consumer demand, which is interesting.

Initial Update from December ITG Congress

Below is the public release about the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers' Federation's recent World Congress. In the wake of former ITG Secretary-General Neil Kearney's sudden death, the future work of the federation is very unclear. For those interested in how to send condolences to Neil Kearney's family, I would recommend emailing office@itglwf.org.

ITGLWF 10th World Congress Ends in Frankfurt

The ITGLWF 10th World Congress, which ended in Frankfurt last Friday, adopted a number of major decisions to guide the work of the International over the coming period.

The Congress, held under the motto “organize = decent work = decent life”, met from December 2nd-4th, 2009 and brought together 214 delegates from 97 organizations, in 68 countries.

The Congress paid tribute to the tremendous work carried out over the past twenty-one years by Neil Kearney, the late General Secretary who died of a heart attack in Bangladesh just two weeks before the start of the Congress.

The Congress confirmed the appointment of a new General Secretary, Patrick Itschert. Patrick takes over at the international level after nearly two decades as Secretary of the European regional organisation, ETUC:TCL, a post which he continues to hold.

The Congress unanimously elected as President Hisanobu Shimada, General Secretary of the one million-strong UI Zensen of Japan. It also placed on record its appreciation of the work of Manfred Schallmeyer of IG Metall, who served as President for the past five years and whose organization, IG Metall, graciously hosted the Congress at its headquarters in Frankfurt.

The Congress elected fifteen Vice-Presidents, eight of whom are women, and formally approved the membership of the Executive Committee. The EC brings together representatives of countries with a combined membership of at least 3,000 paid-up members, including Argentina, Australia, Austria, Bangladesh, Belgium, Bosnia Heryegovina, Chad, Congo, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, Finland, Germany, Italy, India, Ivory Coast, Netherlands, Niger, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, Senegal, Serbia, South Africa, Spain, Sri Lanka, Sweden, Togo, Turkey, the United Kingdom and the United States. Leif Hakansson of IF Metall of Sweden and Erich Bach of IG Metall of Germany were appointed as auditors.

One of the major issues on the agenda of the Congress was the future of the ITGLWF, with interventions from Jyrki Raina, General Secretary of the International Metal Workers’ Federation and from Manfred Warda, General Secretary of the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions.

The Congress noted that corporate restructuring has blurred the boundaries between different manufacturing sectors. It recognized the need for a powerful trade union force across manufacturing, capable of propelling the industry back to a central role within economies and providing a more powerful counterpart to transnational companies, while providing the best possible representation and services to members. It resolved that the ITGLWF should make all necessary efforts to ensure that the creation of a new global union federation for manufacturing is concluded no later than 2011. The new organization should be structured to include democratic and representative mechanisms ensuring a voice for all trade union members in all sectors of manufacturing, including textiles, clothing, leather and footwear.

The Congress adopted an Agenda for Action highlighting the priority issues for the ITGLWF in the coming period in relation to the core activities of organizing, improving the representation of workers, and involving members in the democratic life of their unions. Delegates discussed and agreed a number of motions relating to these three key areas of action.

Other major issues on the agenda included the economic recession, which has put in jeopardy the future of 20 million workers in the textile, garment and shoe industries. Delegates discussed the trade union action that is needed to address the crisis and called for an end to unregulated globalization and for a recovery strategy that puts decent work at the heart of the global economy.

Attention was also devoted to the issue of women at work and in trade unions, and motions were adopted calling for measures to ensure full gender equality and to increase and sustain women’s representation in unions.

In addition to devoting attention to the many problems facing workers in the sector, the Congress heard organizing success stories from different parts of the world, including Turkey, Cambodia and Cambodia, where a combination of trade union action and pressure from brands and retailers has resulted in the reinstatement of unfairly dismissed trade union leaders, the resolution of conflicts, and the introduction of mature industrial relations.

Ken Silverstein on Kristoff

Speaking of Kristoff recycling the same pro-sweatshop columns, check this out. Am working on getting a copy of Silverstein's recent Harper's article up...

Jeff Ballinger on The New York Times & Nicholas Kristof

Jeff Ballinger provides interesting commentary about changes in coverage of sweatshop issues at The New York Times, and of course, on Nicholas Kristof's love for sweatshops. Kristof rewrites essentially the same column on a yearly/semi-annual basis. A former USASer named Joel Feingold once wrote him a letter about one of these columns. Part of Kristof's response might surprise you, although I think its probably possible for USAS to co-exist alongside groups like UAEM.