Article: - 4.8.2009
NEW DELHI (AP) — The Indian children reportedly found making clothes for Gap Inc. should be reunited with their families and compensated by the government, activists said Monday amid a spreading scandal about the use of child labor by the international clothing chain. The reported discovery of children as young as 10 sewing clothes for clothing retailer Gap Inc. in a New Delhi factory has renewed concerns about child labor in India, but government officials offered no comment Monday. ''The biggest responsibility here lies with the Indian government — they don't develop a way of monitoring'' factories, said Bhuwan Ribhu, a lawyer who works with Bachpan Bachao Andolan, or the Save Childhood Movement. ''International companies hire subcontractors and then forget about it. There is no monitoring at all,'' Ribhu added. ''Where the Gap is concerned, at least they've taken a good pro-active stand against the subcontractors.'' Britain's Observer newspaper on Sunday reported that it had found children making clothes with Gap labels in a squalid factory in New Delhi. It quoted the children as saying they were from poor parts of India and had been sold to the sweatshop by their impoverished families. Some said they were not paid for their work. Gap responded quickly, saying the factory was being run by a subcontractor who was hired in violation of Gap's policies, and none of the products made there will be sold in its stores. ''We appreciate that the media identified this subcontractor, and we acted swiftly in this situation,'' Gap spokesman Bill Chandler told The Associated Press on Sunday. ''Under no circumstances is it acceptable for children to produce or work on garments.'' Child labor remains a widespread problem in India, despite the country's economic boom and its growing wealth. The government has repeatedly tried to ban the use of child workers — in 1986 outlawing them from working in dangerous industries, such as glassmaking, and last year banning them being employed as domestic servants or in restaurants. But the prohibitions have had only a minimal impact and children's rights activists estimate that 13 million children are still working in India, with many being used in labor-intensive businesses like carpet-weaving and in dangerous industries, such as making fire crackers. Chandler said Gap requires its suppliers to guarantee that they will not use child labor to produce garments. Gap stopped working with 23 factories last year over violations uncovered by its inspectors. The San Francisco-based company has 90 full-time inspectors who make unannounced visits around the world to ensure vendors are abiding by Gap's guidelines, he said.

Article: Crunch-time for Nestle - 3.20.2009
The ILFR has sued Nestle for their involvement in the trafficking, and torturing of child workers in West Africa cacoa plantations. The suit was filed in the Federal District Court in LA on behalf of a group of Malian children who being trafficked into the Ivory Coast to work on plantations. The children reported to have worked 12- 14 hours a day, received frequent beatings, and given little food and allowed minimal sleep. • Co-op America and Global Exchange are the most vocal not-for-profit groups about chocolate industry wrongdoings. These groups have worked together make a usable database of articles about the sometimes hidden business practices of large corporations. . • Global Exchange rated Nestlé as on the “Most Wanted Corporate Human Rights Violators of 2005,” for using slave labor, and their poor health and environmental standards. • Oxfam rated Nestlé as the worst company for corporate responsibility out of forty companies in the food industry. They gave Nestlé “F’s” in all categories including environmental sustainability, human rights, labor practices, ethics and governance, and health and safety.

Article: Victoria's Secret becomes known - 3.10.2009
D.K. Garments is a subcontract factory with 150 foreign guest workers (135 from Bangladesh and 15 from Sri Lanka), which has been producing Victoria's Secret garments for the last year. None of the workers have been provided their necessary residency permits, without which they cannot venture outside the industrial park without fear of being stopped by the police and perhaps imprisoned for lack of proper documents. The Victoria's Secret workers toil 14 to 15 hours a day, from 7:00 a.m. to 9:00 or 10:00 p.m., seven days a week, receiving on average one day off every three or four months. All overtime is mandatory, and workers are routinely at the factory 98 to 105 hours a week while toiling 89 to 96 hours. Treatment is very rough, as managers and supervisors scream at the foreign guest workers to move faster to complete their high production goals. Workers who fall behind on their production goals, or who make even a minor error, can be slapped and beaten. Despite being forced to work five or more overtime hours a day, the workers are routinely shortchanged on their legal overtime pay, being cheated of up to $18.48 each week in wages due them. While this might not seem like a great deal of money, to these poor workers it is the equivalent of losing three regular days' wages each week. Workers are allowed just 3.3 minutes to sew each $14 Victoria's Secret women's bikini, for which they are paid four cents. The workers' wages amount to less than 3/10ths of one percent of the $14 retail price of the Victoria's Secret bikini (info. courtesy of http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jonathan-tasini/victorias-secret-slave-_b_74261.html )

Link: Stop Firestone - 3.4.2009
A History of Exploitation- The Firestone Tire and Rubber Company has operated the world’s largest rubber plantation in the world in Harbel, Liberia for over 80 years. Firestone signed a concession agreement with the government of Liberia to lease over one million acres of land in 1926 for 6 cents per acre for a period of 99 years. In 2005, Firestone signed a new 37-year agreement with a transitional government in Liberia to lease the land for 50 cents per acre. All rubber produced in Liberia is sent to the United States for processing into tires and no processing or manufacturing is done in Liberia. FIRESTONE USES CHILD LABOR: Firestone workers must tap trees in order to extract the latex necessary for making rubber tires. The rubber tappers must meet a daily production quota or their already low wages will be halved. By Firestone Natural Rubber Company CEO Dan Adomitis’ own admission on CNN, it would take over 21 hours to meet the quota. As a result, tappers are forced to bring their children and wives to work. Children are forced to carry two 70 pound buckets of rubber on their shoulders for miles. Tappers and their children must apply toxic pesticides without protection. (Information courtesy of "Stop Firestone" - www.stopfirestone.org - )

Article: Cocoa Info. - 3.2.2009
Mars Incorporated is the umbrella company producing candy such as M&M's, Skittles, Starburst, Twix, 3 Musketeers, Dove chocolate, Snickers, Milky Way, and Pedigree, Sheba, and Whiskas pet foods. It is the third largest privately owned company in the US. (info from http://biz.yahoo.com/ic/40/40297.html )