The truth behind the IPAD revolution

 

by Alexandra Delmage

IPAD was recently launched as a revolution in communications technology but behind closed doors and high wire fences the production process is far  from innovative or futuristic.

During a week long investigation, both Andrew Nalone and Richard Jones  from the Daily Mail spoke to dozens of Foxcom workers anonymously. Consistent voices spoke of overcrowded rat infested dormitories, and a life dominated by three factors ‘going to work, coming home from work and sleeping’, ‘With total isolation from the outside world’. To date eleven employees have committed suicide. Dubbed the ‘I-Nightmare Factory’ , China’s biggest exporter employing 420,000 at the vast Foxconn plant in Shenzhen, new recruits at Foxconn undergo weeks of military style drilling to install regimental discipline intended as factory boss Terry Gov states to “agglomerate them to act in unison” What we’re left with are visions of a battery hen workforce. Any hint of individuality and personal creativity is quailed as all employers are ordered to wear jackets bearing slogans such as “together everyone achieves more”.

Overwork and degrading conditions

With consistent claims of overwork poor pay is poor and inhumane conditions, another employee died last week from exhaustion according to SACOM (Students and Scholars against Corporate misbehavior) a Hong Kong pressure group that is reviewing the ongoing events at Foxconn. On daily basis workers face the constant pressure of meeting daunting targets with pay docked under a bizarre dehumanized points system, where deductions are made for having long nails,being late, yawning, eating, talking or walking quickly.

No suicide clauses

Imagine working under these conditions. Legally binding contracts and signed declarations that you will not kill yourself , and a personal promise that you will not sue your company as a result of “unexpected death or injury” including suicide or self torture. Foxconn’s response has been to encase their buildings with ‘ai xin wang’, translating to ‘loving hearts’, in reality these ‘loving hearts’ are oppressive looking 15ft nets designed to capture those workers with suicidal tendencies.

According to the Daily Mail, Saturday June 12th 2010 this is the reality for Foxconn employees, China’s biggest exporter, working physically and emotionally crippling 15hr shifts, to ensure the Western worlds demand for the latest Ipad, Apple’s new state-of-the-art slimline computer, is met. Telegraph TV also cites a similar story and runs a short film on Chinese protesters lobbying for the rights of Foxconn workers at the head office in Hong Kong.

However, the sad reality is that in China there are indeed far worse places to work than Foxconn. As Nick Cohen writes for Guardian, destitution and poverty are a reality, and for the “millions of young people seeking to escape mass unemployment, a job in Shenzhen is not the worst option.”

So what can we do? Stop buying Apple? Unfortunately Foxconn’s products extend to include Nintendo, Nokia, Sony, HP and Dell too. In abandoning Apple it seems that one must entirely disassociate oneself from the computer age and the 21st century. Certainly we all need to be campaigning for better working conditions across the globe. Last Monday, Hon Hai Precision, Foxconn’s parent company, announced net profits of 18bn new Taiwan dollars (NTD) for the first quarter (£397m), a rise of 34.8pc year-on-year.

A worthy reminder to Foxconn is Article 4, of the UN declaration of human rights which states, no one shall be held in slavery or servitude; slavery and the slave trade shall be prohibited in all their forms.

Image: Telegraph.co.uk, workers in China burning the IPAD in protest at working conditions.

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