Nike is one of the top sports clothing industry in the world. However, for years there are fresh allegation for Nike, which dogged by sweatshops and child labour (Daily Mail Reporter, 2011). On the 13 July 2011, Nike has revealed several cases of worker abused at factory.
In the year of 2011, the workers from the Pou Chen Group factory in Sukabumi, Indonesia has spoken out the happening of worker abused within the factory. They said they are being abused physically and mentally (Daily Mail Reporter, 2011). The article reported that the abuse toward the workers, including being slapped and kicked by supervisor and thrown the shoes at them as well as called them dog and pigs (Vindy.com, 2011).
The occurrence of abuse among the contractors has admitted by Nike Company. However, Nike Company declares that there was little it could do to cease it. In March and April in the year of 2011, the Associated Press (AP) interviewed the dozens of workers that work for the contractor factories. At the Pou Chen plant which operate by the Taiwanese in Sukabumi, a supervisor has kicked out one of the female worker due to the mistake she made while cutting rubber for soles. The woman said they are no autonomy in making the rational decision to speak out the fact or truth (Daily Mail Reporter, 2011).
Pou Chen is situated in an unsophisticated city where the
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It found that the abusive treatment to the worker happen in many of the Nike plant. Also, the complaints made by the worker ranged from workweeks which is more than 60 hours to being forbidden to bath. The investment on the training of the manager has implemented heavily by the Beaverton, Oregon-based company in order to reinforce the ability in monitoring closely of the company activities (Daily Mail Reporter,
The highly recognized name brand—Nike— fails to notice the faults that are happening in factories that are violating a few disturbing rules. The company’s reputation has decreased due to demands and claims Nike; implying that they utilize sweatshops to produce more products at a lower pay. The company has been sued numerous times for abusing and exploiting their employees in factories for years. Another problem that Nike has faced throughout the years was making employees work in poor environments that affected the health of many— which contributed to being abused by the manager for not going to work. Nike distributes and sells merchandise of high quality for a high value. The company is giving the satisfaction of quality service to their
Since the 1990s, Nike has been embroiled in controversy over its use of sweatshops. Including numerous media reports of workers earning very little an hour (14 cents per hour), and even workers abused by sub-contractor (Allarey, 2015). Incidents such as these are ingrained in Nike’s history and not quickly forgotten. However, as CEO I would like to attempt to correct wrongs.
In his report of Nike’s suppliers, Young did not mention the serious health and safety issues at the plant.21 In short, more than simply another example of poor working conditions at one of Nike’s supplier’s plants, this episode called into question the company’s honesty about and commitment to labor and environmental/health standards. These three events, combined with the numerous others that were reported in the press, created a major public relations problem for Nike. (Appendix C traces the number of negative articles about Nike that appeared in major publications.) Increasingly, labor and environmental problems at Nike’s suppliers’ factories were becoming a major problem for Nike itself.At Nike shops. Nike’s Response: Learning to Become a Global Corporate
Sources state ex-employees and present day employees have filed reports of Nike’s harsh and unjust working conditions as far back as the 1990’s. Although Nike denied it at times, there was solid proof that children under the age of 16 were also working in these conditions, as most adults would. These sweatshops
Nike Inc., the sports apparel multinational company has been under suspicion and scrutiny for their practice of the unfair treatment and negligent labor habits in their offshore factories. They have been criticized for human rights abuse, child labor law violations, as well as minimum wages and trade union relations violations within a number of Asian countries. They subsequently misguided the public in an attempt to make one believe there is no substance to the allegations of their involvement. The abusive and exploitative treatment and working conditions in these factories has been touted as inhumane in nature as well as an implored violation of worker’s human rights (Figure 1).
Nike is a worldwide global corporation that has its shoes manufactured on a contract basis in places like Asia, China, and Vietnam. Although it does not actually own any of the manufacturing locations, it has long been accused of having its products manufactured in facilities that exploit workers. Although Nike admits some wrongdoing in the manufacturing facilities of its contractors, it claims to have started a commitment to improve working conditions in those facilities.
In America, Nike's owners see the abuse much differently. In front of hundreds of shareholders, after announcing record earnings and another stock split, Nike's president and CEO, Phil Knight minimized the problems in Asia as simply an incident in which a single worker was hit over the head by a supervisor. Nike spokesperson Jim Small, while knowing that the conditions in the sixteen Indonesian plants are not ideal, said, "The bottom line is: Do we abuse our workers? Absolutely not." (Levy, "Working conditions protested at the opening of a new store). Roberta Baskin of CBS News commented that, "It turns out Nike has a great deal to learn about what goes on inside these factories."
The working conditions in Nike factories overseas were far below the standards accepted in the developed world. Though these standards of living were normal and acceptable in those countries, the disparity between the developed countries and the underdeveloped countries stresses Nike’s responsibility towards its employees. Substantial long working hours and overtime were the norm by Nike employees who are anxious to remain employed. In some locations, Nike factory laborers worked for seventeen hours in silence. Workers were not allowed to use the bathroom more than once in an 8-hour shift and they were not allowed to drink water more than twice per shift; this is sheer wickedness and inhumane (Watch, 1997).
They should be responsible for the legal, social and philanthropic aspects of its subcontracted factories. They are not paying their employees the legal minimum wage, caring about the working conditions and welfare of these employees and just not taking into consideration the well-being of others. Ten years ago, the company had been subjected to negative press, lawsuits, and demonstrations on college campuses alleging that the firm’s overseas contractors’ subject employees to work in inhumane conditions for low wages. With the introduction of the fair labour association and worker rights consortium, Nike is slowly trying to improve the working conditions on subcontracted factories and hopefully in 10 years, they would be able to re-establish themselves as a morally acceptable company.
During the late 80s and early 90s Nike was faced with a series of labor strike back at home due to unethical labor practices by its independent countries in third world countries. It is well known for Nike to outsource almost all its production from third world countries at cheap prices and sell them in U.S. market at an abnormal profit. The company began outsourcing its products from Japan where labor was competent and wages were very low. The living standards were raised which prompted Nike to outsource its products from Thailand, Pakistan and Indonesia since wages in these countries were extremely low and labor for these products were competent due to rapid development of the Japanese economy. The outsourcing of footwear products from Asian countries enables Nike to earn high profits and enjoy a competitive advantage over its rivals in the footwear industry. The company invests the high profits realized in marketing its products through celebrities. For instance, Michael Jordan was used to advertise the positive image of Nike Company (Lipschutz and James, pp. 87-96).
The company Nike operates in over 50 different companies. This makes them a very large global company. Nike makes all kinds of products including gym shoes, clothing and apparel, equipment and accessories. “In 2004, Nike products were manufactured by more than 800 suppliers, employing over 600,000 workers in 51 countries” (Locke, Kochan, Romis & Qin, 2007, p. 6). Nike came under fire because of their workers that work outside the United States. In other countries, labor laws are unlike those within the United States. Large corporations often exploit the fact that they can pay laborers significantly less outside of the United States. Companies may also provide less than favorable working conditions to its labor force outside of the United States.
Nike is one of the largest most popular sports/athletic brands worldwide. They are number one producer and sellers of sportswear shoes and apparel (Nike Inc, 2017). Being number one the brand now has a market value of almost $30 million, and does seem to be stopping growth (Nike Inc, 2017). Created in 1964, Nike has continuously grown adding many diffusion lines to their brand to be more distinct for different sports. Not only does Nike encompass almost all sports, but also they have brilliant marketing and their trademark “Just Do it” partnered with the swoosh logo, which is endorsed by celebrities makes Nike a desirable product. A demand that is worldwide requires employees that are willing work around the clock, are paid less than minimum wage, and even employed children workers. At least these were some of the things that Nike thought they needed, to increase profits and get their product distributed. Nike made a huge mistake trying to cut cost by exploiting workers in south Asian countries. Their ethical integrity was compromised and many consumers would not buy from Nike, however now years later Nike has revamped their image with foundations and a traceable supply chain. Hopefully, these measures Nike have taken will prevent any further ethical issues in the future.
The Pou Chen factory is located in a place where the minimum wage is far below the national average. It has 10,000 workers who make Converse sneakers. Most of the workers are women, and they earn only 50 cents an hour. The amount that they earn is not even enough to cover their food and very poor housing. In this factory, the women are both physically and verbally abused. Nike’s own investigations have proved these complaints to be true. The company made a statement saying that immediate actions would be taken to deal with the situation. It is interesting to note that, “an internal Nike report, released to the Associated Press after it inquired about the abuse, showed that nearly two-thirds of 168 factories making Converse products worldwide failed to meet Nike’s own standards for contract manufacturers. Twelve are in the most serious category, ranging from illegally long work hours to
Another perspective is to analyse based on the amount of good done as compared to the amount of bad. By subcontracting its operations in underdeveloped countries, Nike helps to create job and improve the lives of the employed. Then, we have to consider the poor working conditions, poor wages, and the constant violation of child labour laws. Now, the bad inevitably outweighs the good despite the lack of unit of measurement in the
production was on the peak with over 40,000 shoes unit a month according to Locke (2002) the company was ready for globalization trades and worldwide expansion. Nike Inc. had hundreds of factories and thousands of employees, producing different designs and style of shoes. The Company was able to create new line department such as apparel athlete clothes and other equipment, they were selling high quality products which increased their sales and allowed the company to make considerable profits. The outsourcing jobs that Nike Inc. brought overseas were creating jobs for the population in those countries which also help boost the economy of those outsourced countries. As negatives impacts we can cite the poor working conditions for the labors in those outsourced countries, the health issues the product used to manufacture the shoes have engendered to the labors that are touching them every day and the low salary paid to the workers that don’t comply with the minimum wage. Murphy and Matthew (2001) argued that a high percentage of the workers were under aged which mean that Nike Inc. was involve in child labor, there were strong allegations of abuse and violence to women working in some of the factories of Nike Inc. all those were situations that have suffice to affect Nike Inc. image and ruin its public relationship with the media