• A year ago, we established a new class of 60 hours. That is going be difficult to achieve, partly because the workers themselves don’t prefer this option.
Wage and Working Hours The Chinese government has a 40-hour workweek and, additionally, 36 hours per month for overtime. That means an average working week of 49 hours. I do not know one factory that uses this kind of working time. The workers also do not want that because they simply don’t earn enough. That is even the opinion of the younger generation. In February of this year, the minimum weekly wage in Shenzhen was 1806 RMB, which is about $300 U.S. If you work 60 hours, you will get $600. That is the minimum wage plus 20 hours paid double overtime. And if you work 66 hours, you’ll earn $700. Compare that with wages in countries such as Bulgaria, Romania, or Ukraine, and that’s not bad. All buyers complain about the rising labor costs. In countries like India or Sri Lanka workers earn $120 a week. During the next five years, the labor costs are just acceptable, but what will happen next? Change happens quickly! There is also a significant shortage of workers in China and the toy industry is not an attractive employer. Workers want to work somewhere 11 months in succession: from Chinese New Year until the next Chinese New Year. What does the toy industry provide? They are offered a job from May until roughly October. After that there is no more work for them. The seasonally related work is a killer in that context. The plants often have 250 percent more workers in the summer. We make great products, but they are far less sexy than products that are made by Apple, for instance. And then there is a lot of competition, not only within the industry itself, but also from the rapidly growing service sector. They attract a lot of people, especially because they have easier working conditions. Taxi drivers, maids, and waiters each earn 200 RMB per day. Well, if you have the choice to clean rooms in a hotel with the air conditioning on, or you have to assemble toys on the conveyor belt at a temperature of 36 degrees, what would your choice be? The average age of employees in a toy factory is now 36. Our workers are getting older and the younger generation wants a different quality of life.
MAY/JUNE 2014
About the ICTI CARE Process The ICTI CARE Process has become a great success. We now have a staff of 20 people: 14 in the Hong Kong office and six in our office in Shenzhen. If problems are discovered, I can send two people in a taxi directly to the factory to investigate. One of the most important developments in our program is the training and education of workers, managers, auditors, and even buyers. We have developed a card that will be distributed at each factory that accepts the ICTI CARE Process. On that card, we printed the workers’ rights and a free mobile phone number. On average we get 320 calls a month. Nintey-two percent are requests for information, generally about working hours or overtime. But some boys or girls at 16 years old live in a dormitory at the factory with six others, for example. Because they come from different villages, they can barely understand each other, and they suffer from homesickness. So, we have to cover some psychological issues. Eight percent of the calls are about real problems with working conditions. We can take action immediately when a worker is bullied by a manager or when they are paid too little. The factory owners are already familiar with that, and they know we can also prevent worker strikes. We talk with both parties to solve problems.
Geographic Expansion In the beginning, when I was knocking on factory doors to talk about the ICTI CARE Program, managers said, “Oh no, not another control! I already had 20 this year.” The turning point came when Mattel said it would support the ICTI CARE Process and within three years would stop its own audits. Hasbro followed soon after, creating a snowball effect. Now we are recognized by more than 1,000 different brands and accepted by the majority of retailers. Approximately 1,100 factories accepted the code. We are present in 12 countries, with only one country outside of Asia: Tunisia. We are working hard on geographic expansion. We are now looking at Latin America, Brazil, and Mexico in particular. Brazil is the most important, with at least 200 factories. In India, we have only two factories working with us, but even there we are growing rapidly.” ■
THE TOY BOOK • 121