Out in the Pacific Ocean, on a chain of fourteen islands known as the U.S. Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands, a $1 billion garment industry has been booming since the 1980s. Thousands of garment workers live and toil in deplorable conditions, working up to 12 hours a day, seven days a week, and earning $3.05 an hour or less, often without overtime pay. Yet, the clothes these workers sew carry labels that say %u201CMade in the U.S.A.%u201D
In the last five years, contractors in Saipan have received more than 1,000 citations for violating U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) standards, many of which were characterized as capable of causing death or serious injury, including blocked exits, fire hazards, unsanitary restrooms, and exposed electrical wiring. The crowded, unsanitary factories and shanty-like housing compounds are in flagrant violation of federal law. The heat in some factories is so extreme it can cause workers to faint. Many live in a room with up to seven other people in in ward-pointing barbed wire-enclosed barracks. Their movements are strictly supervised by guards, and are subject to lockdowns or curfews. Complaints about the conditions are met with threats of termination, physical harm, and summary deportation.
As your customers, we want to express my concern about the sweatshop conditions and labor abuses on the U.S. island of Saipan. As a global company contracting in dozens of countries worldwide, it has an obligation to its customers and its workers in labor standards that is occurring in the garment industry.
In Saipan, has a responsibility to lead the way towards ending labor and human rights abuses by taking steps to:
* Protect workers' rights, including the freedom of association and collective bargaining.
*Abolish the use of labor contracts that deny workers their basic human rights.
*Ban the collection of recruitment fees and create a trust fund to repay such fees for all present and former workers, and pay return passage for any present or former worker who wishes to return home.
* Set up a credible, enforceable independent monitoring system, with semiannual public reports, to ensure an end to all labor,health and safety abuses.
I thank you for your attention to this urgent matter and look forward to hearing your response.
