Four Overseas Garment Workers Speak Out

Four Overseas Garment Workers Speak Out
This Valentine’s Day, wear your heart on a sweatshop-free sleeve

Sara Williams

In Kenya, Branice Musavis works and leads a union at the Protex factory. She produces for Wal-Mart, JC Penny, and Steve and Berry’s University Sportswear.

In Indonesia, Siti Malikhah works and leads a union at the PT Kolon Langgeng factory which produces Nike merchandise.

In Thailand, Phannara Duangdet works and leads a union at the Lian Thai factory.

This week, these three workers will share their stories and open dialogue with UCSC students about their work in the garment industry. Organized by New Students Against Sweatshops Campaign (NSASC) the event “Real Voices, Real Lives,” will be held Tuesday, Feb. 14 at 8 p.m. in Classroom Unit 2.

“These workers, getting the chance to share their story is empowering for them,” NSASC co-ordinator for the Santa Cruz division Jalal Haddad said. “Having us western students as an audience to show them that we do care is good as well. I’m pretty sure students don’t want people around the world to be suffering at our expense.”

Organizers have tailored the event to people of all backgrounds, so that those who “don’t know anything” about the overseas garment industry and those “who have been organizing or know a lot” can take something useful away, said Sara Bloomberg, event co-organizer and co-coordinator of Santa Cruz’s NSASC division.

National organizer of United Students Against Sweatshops (USAS) Jessica Rutter hopes the event will update people on present-day struggles in the garment industry. “In the last few years, as conditions in the factories have changed [for the better], a lot of brands have been pulling out,
which weakens the factories and the unions.”

Piloted by USAS, NSASC “calls on universities to adopt a new policy to make all college apparel in factories where there’s a union. Also, that the brands like Nike, Champion, and Adidas pay more to those factories so that workers can make a living wage,” Rutter said.

The event will bring three unique voices from across the globe.

They will provide insight and experience and emphasize the reasons the NSASC needs support.

“Real Voices, Real Lives,” is a unique opportunity for a reality-check on the issue of product and production.

Real live producers will be present, telling their story and ready to answer questions and concerns. Come, because really, as Bloomberg put it, “How often do you get to talk to the people who make your clothes?”