What is a maquila and why should I care?

I first heard the word maquila when I went to Honduras. A maquila is a factory. In Honduras there are quite a few of them. They have been built because Honduras is a source of cheap labor, and because the Honduran government has allowed factories to come into the country on a tax-free basis.

The Honduran economy has not created enough jobs for the people so the government sees maquilas as a way to provide employment for the people. Most of us would use a different word for maquilas. We would call them sweatshops.

A report I read on the Christian Commission for Development (CCD) web site (www.ccdhondruas.org) said, "Most workers last less than six years working in a maquila, though many quit after one or two years due to severe health problems caused by work conditions, or are fired and black-listed for trying to defend their rights. After six years of work, most workers' bodies physically give out and they can no longer meet the high quotas demanded. Workers are left unemployed and disillusioned; having spent six of their prime years hunched over a sewing machine without an advanced education, without opportunities for advancement, and sometimes severe health problems."

On the web site I found the stories of some of the people who have worked in the maquilas. "Sara Ortiz, a maquila worker at the Q.R. Fashion #1 factory in ZIP El Porvenir, had to leave school in the fifth grade to work in African palm fields as a picker. She worked alongside her mother earning fourteen cents for each sack she picked, all told, about four dollars a week. By age fifteen she left the palm fields for a small room in the city and a job in the maquila. High school was out of the question for Sara."

The people who work in Maquilas are caught in a vicious cycle. They work long hours for low pay. They will not have enough money to allow their own children to finish high school. Their children will go to work without education. They won't be able to educate their children, and they won't have the education necessary to fight for their own rights. The cycle will continue.

"Dilcia Matamorros, a worker at Cheil, struggled to continue her studies throughout her three years working in the maquila. With only her internship left to complete, she asked the maquila for three months unpaid leave to finish her studies. The maquila denied her this leave, telling her she would not give her back her job if she left. The maquilas do not provide young people opportunities to continue their education, and in fact impede them from doing so. In fact, maintaining this huge pool of unskilled labor directly benefits the maquilas as it provides them with cheap workers who are uneducated about their rights."

The problems of low pay and lack of educational opportunities are compounded by blatant abuse of the workers in some of the maquilas. Many of the maquilas use incentives, which create peer pressure to work faster. Others use intimidation tactics. "Some of the worst physical and verbal abuses occur in smaller maquilas that are sub-contracted by the larger maquilas in the industrial parks. In Guanchia, a small town outside the industrial center of El Progreso, SEIL Trading is a subcontractor infamous for its managers' verbal abuse of workers. Workers report that one supervisor in particular regularly humiliates and intimidates workers, putting her face eight inches in front theirs, shouting insults and critiques, and has been know to hit workers and pull their hair."

"Blatant violations of labor laws are also common practice in Honduran maquilas. The national labor code explicitly states that workers cannot work more than 44 hours a week and that mandatory over time is illegal. However, due to the Honduran labor ministry's complacency overtime is regularly required by many maquilas with serious pay penalties if a worker fails to comply. Many workers claimed that they had reported abuses to the Ministry of Labor and had received false information about the validity of their claims, which were later reviewed by a lawyer. Claims were also made that the labor minister was receiving pay-offs directly from maquila owners and was pocketing a fair percentage of workers' severance checks."

"An example of the abuse of the quota system is the experience of Noemi Calderon, a worker at SEIL Trading. Noemi, nineteen, has a daily quota of ironing between 800-1100 dress shirts a day. Air conditioning is not provided in the factory, nor can she have a fan on her because that would interfere with the ironing. She enters work at seven am, works very hard and occasionally completes her quota early. However, when she is close to completing her quota, the supervisor arbitrarily raises it. Her workday is supposed to end at five p.m. however she is normally required to work till seven p.m. When she works five days a week from seven am to seven p.m., she earns twenty-six dollars a week. After she pays for transportation and food she only ends up taking home thirteen dollars."

When I read about problems like this I begin to wonder about whether or not I am supporting the companies that commit these types of abuses by the purchases I make. Most of the products made in the maquilas are sold in the United States. I wonder how many of our countries elected officials are aware of the abuses committed by companies that sell their goods here. Would I be willing to pay more for a product produced by a company that paid a decent wage and maintained safe, and reasonable working conditions? Would it do any good to write to Minnesota's congregational representatives and tell them that the time has come to insist that companies doing business in the United States pay their workers a living wage?

This seems like an issue that I am powerless to do very much about. But I can keep these people in my prayers and I can spread the word about this situation. If you have an opportunity to visit the CCD website and read their complete article on the maquilas please do so. A copy of the article will also be available in the church library.

If you know of actions that I can take as an individual or that we can take as a congregation to support fair and reasonable work place practices please let me know.

May God bless each and every one of you.

Sincerely,

Pastor Birk