Date of publication: October 9, 2008
Source: Business Week
Author: Pallavi Gogoi
Workers at a Bangladesh factory were made to work up to 19-hour shifts and paid as little as $20 a month, says a SweatFree Communities report
The world's largest retailer, Wal-Mart Stores (WMT), is being accused of buying school uniforms that were made under extreme sweatshop conditions at a factory in Bangladesh.
The JMS Garments Factory in Chittagong, Bangladesh, produces school uniforms that are sold in Wal-Mart stores under the Faded Glory brand name. A report from SweatFree Communities, an anti-sweatshop activist group based in Bangor (Me.), found that workers at the factory work up to 19-hour shifts to finish Wal-Mart's orders under tight deadlines; are made to stand for hours as punishment for arriving late to work; and are frequently subject to verbal abuse and kicking or beatings. Some workers earn as little as $20 each month, the group says—even lower than the country's legal minimum wage of $24 per month...