Reuters
July 12, 2001
By Christopher Noble

BOSTON, July 12 (Reuters) - Nike Inc. on Thursday unveiled an Internet video tour of a factory in Vietnam that emphasized good pay, benefits and working conditions in an effort to lay to rest allegations that its products are made in sweatshops.

"The Webcast provides a unique look inside our partner factories in Vietnam and continues our dedication to being among the more transparent companies in the apparel and footwear industry," Dusty Kidd, Nike's vice president for compliance, said in a statement.

In the 1990s Nike, the world's No. 1 maker of athletic shoes and apparel, came under severe criticism for using factories that paid very low wages and for making workers toil long hours in unsafe conditions using harmful materials.

A 1996 photograph of a child sewing a Nike soccer ball in a factory in Pakistan caused indignation and tarnished Nike's image as a hip manufacturer for the upscale. Other abuses came to light in other countries including Indonesia. At the time, workers were subjected to harsh corporal punishment and those trying to unionize were fired.

Nike Chief Executive Philip Knight, who acknowledged at the time that conditions in some of its contract factories were unsound, has promised to make improvements, and has instituted a company-wide program to ensure workers are treated decently.

Since the abuses first came to light, media reports and factory visits have demonstrated improvements, but critics say Beaverton, Oregon-based Nike should do more.

In the video (www.nikebiz.com), which is accompanied by sober narration, a factory in Vietnam is described in glowing terms. The video says average pay at the facility is $660 a year, nearly triple the national average.

It shows a clean factory and said the average worker in a factory in Vietnam is a 21-year-old woman from a rural community. The factories all provide free meals, either dormitories or subsidized housing, a medical clinic, schools and micro-credit lending, the Webcast said.

In its statement, Nike conceded that more needs to be done but notes that other companies use it as a benchmark for labor practices.

"By working collaboratively alongside human rights groups and various NGOs (non-governmental organizations) ... Nike seeks to demonstrate that good business practices and human rights can peacefully co-exist," the statement said.

But a report published in May by the fair trade advocacy group Global Exchange says Nike still falls short.

"Nike is nowhere near paying a living wage," said Medea Benjamin, founding director of Global Exchange. "They have yet to make good on their promise of independent monitoring of their factories and workers who try to organize are still fired and harassed."

But Benjamin said the company's performance has improved since the mid-1990s when abuses were rampant.

"There is a lot more care now that the worst abuses don't happen," she said. "The progress (they have) made has been applauded ... but there is still a long way to go."