Workers

Workers strike in Shenzhen - strike planned by management?

Around 20,000 workers from Feihuang Company in Shenzhen went on strike on 20 and 21 August. Two factories of Feihuang, located in Xixiang town and Shajing town of Shenzhen, with some 10,000 workers and 8,000 workers participated in the strike on 20th August.

The workers are protesting against heavy wage cuts coupled with an increased workload. The FeiHuang Factory makes mobile phone accessories for Nokia, Motorola, Sony and other well known brands. In fact according to Feihuang recruitment material it states that every fourth charger in the world is produced by Fei-huang .

According to reports, the factory has been steadily decreasing wages in the last six months – the current wage is around 50 percent of the wages set for this time last year, but the workload has increased
According to the workers, from July 2007, the factory asked each of them to make 90 more chargers every hour than the amount they are originally making (some media states this figure is per hour but this seems unlikely so we estimate a daily rate of around 480 increased to 570 chargers). If they could not finish the task they would then have to  work extra hours, or they would not get the basic salary.

In the morning of 20 August around 1,000 workers from the Xixiang Feihuang factory began blocking the local road and went on strike. Later in the day workers from the night shift joined them and by the morning of the 21 August around 10,000 workers had joined the strike. Meanwhile in neigbouring Shajing, Feihuang workers learned about the news of strike and joined in with a strike by the evening shift. By the morning of 21, about 8,000 workers in Shajing were also on strike. According to the Hong Kong newspaper, Orient Daily, three female workers were beaten and detained by the riot police sent in by the local government. No news has since been made available but it is probable that they have now been released.
Shortly after a group of factory officials, accompanied by security guards came to where the workers were gathering and asked the workers to send in their representatives for a discussion. However the workers refused and instead asked for the release of the detained workers. The police used loudspeakers to ask the workers to leave immediately or face forced dispersal. The security guards from the factory started to separate workers into groups and tried to convince the workers to go back to the factory. The workers returned to the factory, but reportedly continued their strike. 

The factory later came up with a solution. Those wishing to resign would be allowed to [with no  penalty or withholding of wages or “deposits” which is common for workers wishing to resign especially newer ones] . Those resigning would receive all owed wages.  Those who wished to stay would receive a 30 Yuan monthly  pay rise while those in management wishing to stay would receive a 300 yuan pay rise (ten times that of ordinary workers). It is believed that the factory management had in fact planned the initial strike and a high rise was needed to placate management members. As a consequence of this decision around half of the workforce decided to leave the factory.

Background on the factory

The Feihuang Factory in Xixiang town and the Feihuang Electronic Products Factory in Shajing town are reportedly solely owned by a German investor, and along with another factory, the Feihuang Shi-Ya Electric Products Company Limited in Beijing. The factories assemble and produce electronic components and accessories.  At present, they have reportedly sold 200 million mobile chargers, enjoying 23 percent of the global market share.  One report states that the Feihuang Electronic Factory has over 10,000 employees, 9,000 of whom are  female migrant workers from Sichuan, Hunan and Hubei provinces.

A [very] short video covering the strike and giving a figure of 20,000 workers on strike is shown here http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gf6BzYylXcA