WASHINGTON, D.C. - Nike's latest ad campaign featuring women empowered by athletics has triggered a backlash among top women's organizations nationwide, who say Nike's treatment of its Asian factory workers - an overwhelmingly majority of whom are young women - must improve if female consumers in the U.S. are to buy Nike products in good conscience.

"While the women who wear NIKE shoes in the United States are encouraged to perform their personal best - the Indonesian, Vietnamese and Chinese women making the shoes often suffer from inadequate wages, corporal punishment, forced overtime and/or sexual harassment," the women's groups say in a letter to Nike CEO Philip Knight. The document will be released Tuesday, October 29 at a press conference in Washington, D.C.

Among the signers are Pulitzer prize-winning author Alice Walker, U.S. Representative and Chair of the Congressional Black Caucus Maxine Waters, and 15 top women's organizations including the National Organization for Women (NOW), the Feminist Majority, the Black Women's Agenda, and the Ms. Foundation for Women.

The women's groups are calling on Knight to demonstrate a "real commitment to fair labor practices" by paying its Asian factory workers a living wage, and instituting independent monitoring of its factories by local, respected groups.

"When a female worker collapses from heat and over-exhaustion in a Nike subcontractor factory in Vietnam - that's of concern to all women," said Kimberly Miyoshi, Corporate Accountability Director for San Francisco's Global Exchange, a non-profit human rights organization. "Nike must understand that women's rights are human rights - and that they extend well beyond American borders."

Philip Knight
CEO, Nike Corporation
One Bowerman Drive
Beaverton, OR 97005

Dear Mr. Knight:

The women depicted in NIKE advertisements are strong, resilient and empowered by their athletic accomplishments. NIKE's slogan is catchy, "There is NO finish line." Unfortunately, this motto also applies to some of their factories overseas where women, according to payslips from NIKE factories in Indonesia, work from 100 - 200 overtime hours a month to make ends meet.

While the women who wear NIKE shoes in the United States are encouraged to perform their personal best - the Indonesian, Vietnamese and Chinese women making the shoes often times suffer from inadequate wages, corporal punishment, forced overtime and/or sexual harassment.

NIKE has been operating in Vietnam for approximately two years and already one factory official has been convicted of physically abusing workers, another fled the country during a police investigation of sexual abuse charges and a third is under indictment for abusing workers, as reported by the New York Times (6/27/97).

NIKE amassed 553.2 million in net profits in 1996. Yet, women making $1.60 a day in Vietnam, according to payslips from the Sam Yang factory, can barely afford three meals a day, let alone transportation, rent, clothing, health care, and much more. The recent labor strikes protesting inadequate wages involved 10,000 NIKE workers in Indonesia and over 1,300 NIKE workers in Vietnam (April 1997).

NIKE, with its tremendous financial resources, should and must do better. Paying workers a livable wage, would decrease employee turnover, increase productivity and, as a result, enable the company to remain competitive in a global marketplace.

As allies in the struggle for women's rights, we are also deeply concerned about the fact that most NIKE workers in those countries are denied their basic right to free association. If they could join a union without fear of losing their job, they could organize for better wages and working conditions and truly be, in NIKE's words, "empowered."

We urge you to take the following steps to demonstrate a real commitment to fair labor practices:

• At a minimum, pay workers wages that would cover their basic needs. Right now, the local monitoring groups and the workers they represent have determined this would be at least $3.00 per day in Indonesia, the People's Republic of China and Vietnam.

• Institute independent monitoring by respected local groups that meet regularly with workers. For Indonesia, we urge you to hire the Indonesian Sports Shoe Monitoring Network; for Vietnam, Vietnam Labor Watch; and for China, the Hong Kong Christian Industrial Committee.

As advocates for women here and abroad, we hope you give serious consideration to our concerns.

Black Women's Agenda
Center for the Advancement of Public Policy
Center for Women Policy Studies
Coalition of Labor Union Women
California State Assemblyperson Dion Aroner (14th District)
Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Congressional Black Caucus Chair
Equal Rights Advocates
The Feminist Majority
Ms. Foundation for Women
National Council for Research on Women
National Organization for Women
Voters for Choice Education Fund
Alice Walker and Rebecca Walker
Women for Affirmative Action
Women's Environment and Development Organization
Women's Institute for Leadership Development for Human Rights
Women's International League for Peace and Freedom