Cambodian garment workers sew at a factory in Phnom Penh February 26, 2009. Many garment factories in Cambodia are closing as shoppers in the United States, Europe and elsewhere cut back on clothing purchases due to the global financial crisis.(Reuters)Manila Bulletin
By EK MADRA
March 29, 2009
Phnom Penh, March 28 (Reuters) - Mon Moeun, one of thousands of Cambodians pulled out of poverty by a job in the garment trade since foreign investors arrived in the 1990s, may be back rearing pigs soon after a collapse in demand from Western countries.
Many garment factories in Cambodia are closing as shoppers in the United States, Europe and elsewhere cut back on clothing purchases due to the global financial crisis.
Garments are Cambodia’s biggest export earner and its economy may shrink this year due to the drop in demand.
Moeun and his wife have suffered a double blow. They used to earn $80 a month each as garment workers, sending half of it back to support their 8-year-old son living with Moeun’s parents in the southern province of Takeo.
Then, three months ago, their factories shut without notice.
"We see hard times ahead when we get back to the countryside, raising pigs and planting vegetables to make a living," said Moeun, 39, chatting with friends under a tree near a shuttered factory on the outskirts of the capital, Phnom Penh.
More than 1,000 workers were owed pay when South Korean-owned Da Joo (Cambodia) Ltd. closed. It has become an all too familiar story.
At its peak, Cambodia’s garment sector boasted almost 300 factories employing 340,000 workers, many of them women from the countryside.
Foreign companies started to move into the impoverished Southeast Asian country after UN-sponsored elections in 1993, fuelling an economic revival after 30 years of civil war and the horrors of the Khmer Rouge ‘’killing fields’’ in the 1970s.
The monitoring of work conditions by the International Labour Organisation helped lure brands such as Adidas, Nike and Gap, keen to avoid bad publicity from sweatshops. Cambodia’s membership of the World Trade Organisation from 2004 provided another boost.
Factories sprang up where once there were green rice fields around the capital and garments became Cambodia’s biggest export earner. They brought in $2.78 billion in 2008, but that may drop about 30 percent this year, said Kaing Monika, spokesman of the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC).
Exports of garments to the US market dropped nearly 40 percent in January compared with a year earlier. Some 70 percent of the clothes go to the United States, 25 percent to Europe and the rest mainly to South Korea and Japan.
By EK MADRA
March 29, 2009
Phnom Penh, March 28 (Reuters) - Mon Moeun, one of thousands of Cambodians pulled out of poverty by a job in the garment trade since foreign investors arrived in the 1990s, may be back rearing pigs soon after a collapse in demand from Western countries.
Many garment factories in Cambodia are closing as shoppers in the United States, Europe and elsewhere cut back on clothing purchases due to the global financial crisis.
Garments are Cambodia’s biggest export earner and its economy may shrink this year due to the drop in demand.
Moeun and his wife have suffered a double blow. They used to earn $80 a month each as garment workers, sending half of it back to support their 8-year-old son living with Moeun’s parents in the southern province of Takeo.
Then, three months ago, their factories shut without notice.
"We see hard times ahead when we get back to the countryside, raising pigs and planting vegetables to make a living," said Moeun, 39, chatting with friends under a tree near a shuttered factory on the outskirts of the capital, Phnom Penh.
More than 1,000 workers were owed pay when South Korean-owned Da Joo (Cambodia) Ltd. closed. It has become an all too familiar story.
At its peak, Cambodia’s garment sector boasted almost 300 factories employing 340,000 workers, many of them women from the countryside.
Foreign companies started to move into the impoverished Southeast Asian country after UN-sponsored elections in 1993, fuelling an economic revival after 30 years of civil war and the horrors of the Khmer Rouge ‘’killing fields’’ in the 1970s.
The monitoring of work conditions by the International Labour Organisation helped lure brands such as Adidas, Nike and Gap, keen to avoid bad publicity from sweatshops. Cambodia’s membership of the World Trade Organisation from 2004 provided another boost.
Factories sprang up where once there were green rice fields around the capital and garments became Cambodia’s biggest export earner. They brought in $2.78 billion in 2008, but that may drop about 30 percent this year, said Kaing Monika, spokesman of the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC).
Exports of garments to the US market dropped nearly 40 percent in January compared with a year earlier. Some 70 percent of the clothes go to the United States, 25 percent to Europe and the rest mainly to South Korea and Japan.
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