People Before Profit！ Don't Make Asia Pacific A Sweatshop Hell! --Our Strong Call to ABAC Meeting

NAFITU and YFOTU Press Release for Approaching ABAC Action on 517

Time: 12:30, May 17, 2010 (Monday)
Venue: Taipei International Convention Center (No.1, Sec. 5, Hsin-YiRoad, Taipei)
International Contact Persons: Weili Chu (General Secretary, NAFITU): +886-981238732, Lennon Ying-Dah Wong (International Coordinator, YFOTU):+886-933908994

National Confederation of Independent Trade Unions (NAFITU) and Young fast Optoelectronics Trade Union (YFOTU) approach the second APEC Business Advisory Council (ABAC) Meeting in Taipei, state strong calls to the business in Asia Pacific region, demand the corporations to fulfill the Corporate Social Responsibility, wash out the stigma of sweatshop and make advancements towards a real sus-tainable growth for the society as a whole.

The second ABAC Meeting would be held in Taipei from May 17 to 21; the major theme of the meet-ing is “Working towards sustainable growth for all”, in which the knowledge economy is one of the focuses and Cher Wang, Chairperson of HTC would hold a “Knowledge-Based Growth (KBG)” Con-ference. Nevertheless, it’s been a long time that the corporations in Asia Pacific do not care about any-thing but the profits, exploit the workers and the environment continually, which has already caused serious social problems and contradicts to the sustainable growth.

Young Fast Optoelectronics has been sabotaged YFOTU since its establishment in December, 2009 and dismissed 5 union officers and more than 10 active union members in March 2010; YFO is notorious also for its deduction of overtime wages and exploitation on interns and child labors. Violated multiple labor laws, fined and on wait to be prosecuted on different articles, yet YFO still refuse YFOTU’s de-mand to reinstate the illegally-dismissed members. It’s a complete absence of corporate social respon-sibility and open despite to the rule of law in Taiwan!

Regrettably, Samsung, LG and HTC, as the major clients o YFO in the supply chain of touch-panel screens on smartphones, have not monitored YFO and corrected the its wrongdoings, urge the latter to obey the laws, to protect the labor rights until now. It would be an irony for “sustainable growth” as the theme of this ABAC Meeting if the relevant brands do not do anything.

NAFITU and YFOTU demand strongly as followed:

1. Set up code of conducts for the corporations and suppliers, obey the labor laws in each coun-try to fulfill the corporate social responsibility!

Obeying the labor laws in each country and set up code of conduct for the corporations and its suppliers accordingly has already been an important part of corporate social responsibility which has been de-manded by EICC and ISO. Regrettably, in the case of Samsung, LG and HTC, the code of conduct for the suppliers is either just a piece of paper or doesn’t even exist at all! Without the corporate social re-sponsibility, “sustainable growth” is nothing but a lip service.

We strongly demand corporations in Asia Pacific to obey the labor laws in every country and set up code of conduct accordingly, and monitor the labor rights, human rights, protection on the environment and the consumers, as a concrete action to fulfill the corporate social responsibility.

2. Respect the monitor from the union, improve the working condition towards the sustainable growth!

The profits are the output of the workers; the workers shall have the rights to share the fruits of the re-sults as the management and the shareholders equally. A corporation who really cares about the sus-tainable growth shall improve the working condition, respect the monitor from the union, and share the profits with the workers equally.