Manufacture - Haiti Observer Blog

It is not all that bad in Haiti. While we continue to fight among ourselves, Seoul-based company Hansae is planning to take full advantage of the Hope Act by building a new apparel factory in Haiti. They just signed an agreement with Sonapi Industrial Park on Tuesday with the objective to build a new, fully equipped plant.

They will be able to create over 5,000 new jobs in Haiti.

As the company is looking at becoming even a bigger competitor in the apparel field, Haiti is the most attractive location for them at this time. Hansae is considered to be one of the world's largest apparel makers. They currently employ over 60,000 employees from 11 countries. They currently manufacture for companies such as Nike, Gap, H&M, Uniqlo and Abercrombie & Fitch.

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Employers in the Haitian garment manufacturing industry are exploiting their workers as a dirt-cheap form of labor, as well as forcing them to work under unsafe conditions in violation of laws governing the industry. Garment workers are drastically underpaid, on average 32% less than minimum wage requirements. The standard pay rate is $4.54 per eight-hour shift. If they make their quota for the day they receive $6.81. The quotas are set are unrealistically high, the better for employers to avoid paying an extra $2.27 per day.

Henri-Claude Muller-Poitevien, who heads the government of Haiti's Garment Sector Commission (GSC), has an explanation why garment workers can't meet the daily quota. He says they are less able, and need practice to work faster and more competently.

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A report from the Workers' Rights Consortium, the WRC, has shamed Canadian garment company, Gildan Activewear into committing to pay each laborer at their Haitian based factories at least the $7.22 prescribed by the Caribbean country as the minimum wage to be earned by any worker.

The Montreal-based company has suffered weeks of bad pressed following reports by the WRC that its production of college-logo apparel was being made on the backs of people who sometimes were not paid enough to provide themselves with food.

Labeled, 'Stealing from the Poor: Wage Theft in the Haitian Apparel Industry,' the report documented interviews with workers from 5 of the 24 factories in the country. They found and revealed that the average worker was paid a wage that was 32% less than what is stipulated by law. According to the report, these workers were often locked in at the facilities until all work was completed and were without access to health care, were under-fed and had debts that couldn't possibly be met as an average of seven weeks' worth of pay was being siphoned away from them each year.

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The Inter-American Development Bank (IADB) is funding Industrial Revolution II LP (IRII), a recently-created Haiti company to manufacture high-quality clothing. The project is good news for the disenfranchised population of the island, who will be given opportunity for employment at wages above the norm for Haiti workers.

IADB will lend IRII approximately one million dollars to bring a Port-au-Prince clothing plant up to current structural standards for production of higher-quality clothing than is currently being produced. The current model for clothing production relies on large volume, small profit-margin merchandise produced for the masses. This manufacturing model depends on securing the cheapest locales for manufacturing its mass output. When production-facility rents become too high, manufacturers find lower-cost facilities in another country.

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This is an interesting video about the information Wikileaks was able to capture about the outside influence on Haiti.

These information actually showed the pressure exercised by the American Government on Haiti, whether economic or political. As the Wikileaks report published by Haiti Liberte showed, Multi million dollar manufacturing companies from the U.S., with the backing of the US Embassy in Haiti did all they could to prevent the minimum wage for factory workers in Haiti to be $5.00 a day. Some of the companies mentioned include Hanes, Fruit of the Loom and Levi's.

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The job market is expected to be booming in Haiti in a relatively short period of time. If you are able and willing to work, you will be able to find job in Haiti.

The "Haitian Joudalist" learned that South Korea, The United States and the World Bank just signed an agreement to created at least 10,000 jobs in Haiti in the garment manufacturing industry. The Korean clothing producing company, Sae-A will create a brand new industrial park in Haiti just for this operation.

We are looking at Haiti in the near future to become one of the leading exporters of clothing products for the world. The Haitian government is in the planning phase of constructing this new industrial park. It is expected to be located in the North, close to the capital. New port and roads will be built to facilitate transportation.

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