Chinese Foxconn workers labor in a workshop at the Shenzhen plant of Foxconn Technology Group in Shenzhen city, south Chinas Guangdong province, 8 May 2010.
The string of suicides at Foxconn highlight the urgent need for China to adjust its mode of economic growth. On Thursday (27 May 2010) morning, a Foxconn employee tried to kill himself by slitting his wrist at the company dormitory. He survived after receiving medical treatment. His suicide attempt was the 13th by an employee of the Shenzhen-based Foxconn this year. Ten succeeded by jumping out of buildings. With 800,000 employees on the Chinese mainland, the Taiwan-owned companys exports totaled US$55.6 billion in 2008, accounting for 3.9 percent of the mainlands total exports. Foxconn makes computers, game consoles and mobile phones for companies including Apple, Nokia, Hewlett-Packard, and Sony. Foxconn epitomizes Chinas traditional export-driven development pattern: investment and cheap labor combining to produce low value-added products. Processing trade accounts for 50 percent of Chinas total trade volume, and it contributes much to the nations trade surplus. But it is at the low end of the world production chain.
Apple has suspended production of the iPhone 12 at the Foxconn plant in Chennai, India. The choice is linked to a recent report on working conditions in the factory. Notably, the dorms would not meet Apple’s required standards for its partners’ facilities. Food safety levels would also be below these standards. As reported by Reuters, in fact, at the beginning of December about 150 workers of the plant would have been hospitalized due to food poisoning.
Apple halts iPhone production at Foxconn Indian plant
The information revealed by Reuters confirm the dramatic situation that is experienced in one of the main iPhone production plants. The food made available by the canteen services would be of poor quality and in some cases even contaminated, so much so as to involve food poisoning for dozens of workers in the plant which employs 17,000 employees. Also the female workers’ dormitories engaged on the assembly line of the iPhone would not meet Apple “standards” and would be crowded and without toilets.
The statements of the companies
Apple and Foxconn took the necessary countermeasures as soon as the case hit the media headlines. The Cupertino company suspended production activities at the plant, sending some independent auditors who confirmed the non-compliance with the requirements imposed on the production partners. Foxconn apologized and, in an official statement, announced that they are working to improve conditions at the factory.
Apple also reported a similar “incident” last year with a factory owned by another manufacturing partner, Wistron Corp. For the time being, Foxconn has not released information regarding the timing of the resumption of production activities.