Solidarity and Research for Asian Garment Workers

On October 7, the World Day for Decent Work, activists in over a dozen countries launched the Asia Floor Wage campaign. The campaign demands higher wages for garment workers in Asia, based on a common methodology for setting wages at a level that would be enough for workers to live on. The goal of the campaign is to stop factory owners, retailers and brands from driving down wages by pitting workers against one another.

The campaign is different from previous efforts in the garment industry because it is going to attempt to organize along the garment supply chain. This includes pressuring large retailers and buyers to increase the price they pay to factories in order to insure that there is money available for wage increases. The campaign will connect minimum wage, living wage, unionization and other work organizing drives throughout Asia. Eventually, activists in the Asia Floor Wage hope to link with organizing drives in garment retail, shipping, warehouses and trucking in the US and Europe.

Stephanie Luce has been working as a researcher with the campaign. She co-authored an article with Anannya Bhattacharjee and Sarita Gupta, found in the new issue of New Labor Forum here.

as well as a Working Paper released on October 7, discussing the case for raising wages on a regional level, available here.