China Labor News Translations

This May a delegation of leaders representing the American labor federation Change to Win made a groundbreaking visit to China to engage in high level talks with representatives from the All China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU).

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Discussion about workers’ rights and Labor Law in China has again come to focus on large multi-national companies. In February this year, a few journalists from Guangzhou’s New Express on their own initiative went to investigate working conditions at McDonald’s, KFC and Pizza Hut. Several of them posed as students and worked at several facilities. They found that all three fast-food outlets were seriously underpaying their part-time employees. Under Chinese law, part-time employees are entitled to much higher hourly wages than full-time employees because they do not receive the benefits, insurance and stability that come with a full-time position.

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11 rubbish workers in BaoAn district in outer Shenzhen have announced to their boss that they want to start a union at their workplace. The initiative came from a 56 year old man, who has been involved in a union before at a garment factory where he worked as a warehouse manager. In one day, he rallied together 10 of his co-workers – four men and six women, with an average age of 50 years and very little formal education. Five of them are illiterate.

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Originally posted 21 March 2007

This first round of translations from China Labor News Translations includes three Chinese newspaper articles, all related to recent trade union development in China. They report the All-China Federation of Trade Union’s (ACFTU’s) now famous campaign to establish trade union branches in Wal-Mart and Foxconn.

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