Steep rise in wage to affect survival of factories in Cambodia: GMAC president

[geovalin]

PHNOM PENH, Sept. 22 (Xinhua) -- A steep increase in monthly minimum wage for the garment and footwear sector would definitely affect the survival of many factories in Cambodia, said Van Sou Ieng, president of the Garment Manufacturers Association in Cambodia (GMAC) Tuesday.

"Some 35 factories, which were the GMAC members, had closed in the last four months," he said in a press conference, warning that more factories would close if the trade unions demanded an unreasonable high increase in the minimum wage for 2016.

His warning came as tripartite talks on the increase of minimum wage for the sector for 2016 are going on after a 28-percent-wage hike for the sector in January to 128 U.S. dollars per month.

Van Sou Ieng said with allowance, overtime payment and other incentives, the average take-home pay for a worker is currently around 200 U.S. dollars a month.

"Minimum wage for the sector in Cambodia is higher than that of Indonesia, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Myanmar and Laos," he said.

The Cambodian government is expected to announce a new minimum wage for the sector for 2016 next month.

Garment and footwear sector, the kingdom's largest foreign currency earner, are comprised of nearly 1,100 factories with some 700,000 workers, according to the government figures.

The sector exported products worth 3.3 billion U.S. dollars in the first half of 2015, accounted for about 80 percent of the country's total exports.

source: http://www.globalpost.com/article/6654241/2015/09/22/steep-rise-wage-affect-survival-factories-cambodia-gmac-president

[elgordo38]

As I understand it 35 out of 1100 closed their doors and moved on to greener pastures? no sorry where slave wages are cheaper. Its never about the lowly worker only the rich that run these sweat shops and their "overseers" The day will soon come when these greedy buggers will no longer find an oasis of poverty where they can grind out their products paying next to nothing for labor but still charging top end prices. I watched one lady on TV the owner of a upscale hand bag business dressed nice claiming she knew nothing of the mistreatment of the workers that turned out her high end product. Bullshit. These leeches feed off the poor and desperate. These workers like all people are kept in line through fear and intimidation mostly by the government. Its disgusting.

Edited September 22, 2015 by elgordo38

[maidee]

make a shoe for 2.5$ and sell it for 100$ or more in the shops

i am sure giants like reebok, addidas, nike really really cannot afford to pay the people a descent wage as it will eat too much in their scandalous profit slave wage margins

can almost compare it to slave seafood from thailand

[stoli]

It is so easy to blame the manufacturers for the low minimum wages paid to their workers. Having worked for years in sales management for a large auto parts manufacturer in the states, I can tell you that every meeting we had with our customers, after they all joined buying groups. was give us more profit, give us more profit. Then to compete against each other, they passed along all of the extra profit, and asked for more. This would include the Kragen's, Napa's, Checker's, Pep Boys, CARQUEST, etc. We as a manufacturer were not cutting the fat hog. We saw our own margins shrink daily trying to satisfy our customers. The public demands lowers prices. Attack them, including your self, for wanting the same thing. Advocating low prices and higher minimum wages at the same time does not compute. Pick one or the other. You can't have both. Simple economics......