By Chen Anqing

Economic Observer Online

Translated by Ma Zheng

Nov. 22, 2011

Original story: [Chinese]

 
Taiwanese manufacturer Pou Chen Group, known as “the FOXCONN of the shoemaking industry,” last week had to deal with a 2,000 worker-strike, when one of its factories in the Guangdong Province city of Dongugan barred overtime. 

 
Witnesses say that thousands of workers walked from the industrial zone to the office of the local government to express their anger, with factory officials reaching a government-mediated agreement with workers that got them back on the production line at 10 o’clock the next morning.  

 
“We want the workers to share in the factory’s performance,” said Pou Chen representative Li Xieli, who blamed the unrest on new policies designed to cope with lower demand.

 
Workers told the EO that the new law meant no overtime above the normal 8-hours days in a 5-day week. Workers had been earning 1,000 yuan to 2,000 yuan a month for their extra work time.

 
The strike came just after the factory told 18 managers, most of whom had been at the company for more than ten years, they would lose their jobs due to a fall in orders.

 
Outsiders speculate that the factory owners might be planning to move inland, where costs are lower, but the company refused to comment.

 
One of the managers who lost his job questioned the factory’s claims of losses, claiming that productivity had been improving and production targets were met every month.