Olympic Sportswear Producers in Race to Bottom

by James Parks, Jan 21, 2010

As the Winter Olympics approaches, an international coalition of workers’ rights organizations has released its rating of corporate efforts to eliminate sweatshop abuses in their global supply chains.

The ratings are based on the responses of the sportswear companies, including Nike, Adidas, Puma and others, to a series of demands put forward by the coalition on the eve of the 2008 Beijing Olympics. The demands include developing a positive climate for workers to join unions and bargain contracts and paying workers a living wage. You can find the company survey responses and ads here.

Take action by sending a letter here to the sportswear brands, telling them, “It’s time to up your game and start clearing the hurdles for workers’ rights.”

Says Patrick Itschert, general secretary of the International Textile, Garment and Leather Workers Federation:

Many sportswear brands talk a good game. They say they want to uphold core labor standards in the factories producing Olympic-branded goods, but they aren’t willing to take the critical steps to create decent work throughout their supply chain. The goal of our campaign is to make them measure up.

Sportswear workers around the globe work long hours under intense pressure and often earn less than a dollar a day. Many work in dangerous conditions and face overwhelming obstacles to join a union.

International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) General Secretary Guy Ryder says:

Sporting authorities, including the International Olympic Committee and the authorities for individual sports, must make it compulsory that products which carry their logos are produced in decent conditions, with full respect for the rights of the workers making the products.

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