World Cup - Worker Exploitation Continues!

Days before the world's biggest football tournament kicks off in Germany, Labour Behind the Label and the TUC are calling on the football associations behind the 32 competing national teams to insist their sportswear sponsors call time on the production of replica kits in exploitative conditions.

Workers are put at risk in terms of their health & safety ebcause they are forced to work over 80 hours per week in many cases, and because the wage they earn is well below the subsistence level required in their countries.

Given the cost of the replica kits ionvolved, massive profits are being made out of the labour of the workers concerned.

The 'Beautiful Game' surely has blood, sweat and tears on it's hands and is not so 'beautiful' when you examine the conditions forced upon the 'slave labourers'.

Would 'footballers wives', put up with their chlidren working in such exploitative conditions?

In a joint report, 'Sweet FA: Football Associations, Workers' Rights and the World Cup', the two organisations say that the football associations of the world - who are set to pocket more than £200 million in sponsorship this year - have the power to do what few other organisations do, and persuade sportswear companies like Nike, Adidas, Puma and Umbro to change their behaviour.

There is evidence of Honduran workers producing for Adidas and Nike earning just £85 per month, a quarter of what they need to meet their basic needs; Indonesian sportswear workers earning £51 per month, less than half what they need to live decently; and workers in El Salvador producing for Adidas and Nike who lost their jobs when they tried to form a union.

Millions of strips, footballs and other World Cup merchandise will have been sold around the globe in the run-up to the opening game in Munich this Friday, says the report. In the big money world of football, FIFA, the game's governing body made £635 million from the 2002 World Cup - and is expected to make considerably more this time around - and the English FA alone will rake in some £49 million from the 2006 tournament.

'Sweet FA' says that in many of the factories used by the sportswear companies, working weeks of 80 hours or more are not uncommon, hourly rates of pay are so low that workers have to undertake excessive overtime just to make ends meet, and working conditions for most are unsafe. Employees who try to form unions to win better terms and conditions risk dismissal, and in a workforce overwhelming made up of women, maternity leave is rare.

Labour Behind the Label and the TUC want the world's football associations to insert clauses in the contracts they negotiate with the sportswear manufacturers who sponsor their national teams that would:

Further details available on these Websites:

TUSEC

Labour Behind the Label

TUC

Source: TUC Labour Behind The Label

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