Low-wage country, Bulgaria: international apparel companies for their collections of tailoring: The workers get only a little money and suffer from bad working conditions.
Gotse Deltchev – a Bulgarian small town on the border with Greece, the young one searches almost in vain. Most of it moves into the capital city of Sofia or equal to Germany or England in search of better Jobs. The unemployment is high.
One of the largest employers in the textile company Pirintex. Every day thousands of workers flock in the morning to 6 p.m. in the plant hall on the outskirts of the city . It is sewn in Two-layer operation: men’s clothing such as suits and trousers or women’s fashion.
The German businessman Bertram Rollmann was looking for the beginning of the 90s to a new location for his textile company wanted, he had previously managed a clothing factory in Greece. Bulgaria and Romania had at that time good opportunities: low wages and short distances to Western Europe.
On average, he pays his 3000 workers, meanwhile, up to 350 Euro net, and is today regarded in Bulgaria as a model. “We pay above average because we are above-average demand a lot from our employees,” says Rollmann said, referring to the high flexibility, which he demanded of his workers.
The training centre of Pirintex. 30 Lehrlige could learn, at present, there are only seven “apprentices”.
Exploitation of the sewing machine
And it is precisely this flexibility goes too far, says Maria Vanatova we make to the layer outside the factory. She has been working for over ten years in the case of Pirintex. To often needs to be worked on Saturdays, there were employees who could not travel with their families during the summer holidays, because there were too many orders.
In addition, the working conditions were hard. “Senior staff from the stop of our time, we are not able to comply with the requirements,” she says. The salary will be paid according to the specifications, if, for example, in a certain period of time share a certain number of Clothing ready-to-be, there are no supplements, but only a very low basic salary.
Production at Pirintex: Here mainly the women are engaged. You earn 350 Euro a month.
Worse than in Cambodia
This is no isolated case, writes Bettina Musiolek of the “clean clothes campaign”. This non-governmental organization observed in the world the conditions in the textile industry. In a on 25. September published study has compared the working conditions of textile workers in India, Turkey, Cambodia, and Bulgaria.
“It has shocked me that in Bulgaria, the conditions are the worst. In some factories, the workers have to work seven days in a row 12 hours a day”, so Musiolek. Thus, the Situation is much more dramatic than in Asia.
In addition, the low-wage. In the case of a supplier to Swedish fashion brand H&M operated in Bulgaria, for example, it corresponds to only 10 per cent of the so-called living wage, the calculation of the Union “living wage”. That meant that people could not live approximately of their salaries.
Maybe you could pay more?
The worker, Maria Vanatova in Pirintex confirmed. Your friends commuted daily to the crisis-ridden Greece, to work there, or they had emigrated to Cyprus. She had only stayed because of the family in Bulgaria. The work to make your fun anyway – mainly because of the colleagues. She advises but their own children, to leave the country.
The entrepreneur Bertram Rollmann from Bulgaria and says he’ll pay well above average.
Textile entrepreneurs Bertram and roll man with problems – he has lost hundreds of workers in the last two years, and finds no offspring. In his training center, many sewing machines orphaned, only seven trainees in the operation of, space he would have for nearly 30. The wages he does not want to increase anyway. The accusation that the industry had to pay more to keep the people, can not be applied.
Wait for a Signal
The Swedish group H&M has already promised in 2013, to insist that its suppliers, their workers, at least, existence of pay wages. However, there is still happened to to little, says Bettina Musiolek of the “clean clothes campaign”, confirmed by the latest investigation in Bulgaria.
But she is confident: When large companies such as H&M, ernst made the demands to their suppliers to pay more and they would be at the same time willing to accept higher prices, then the signal could have an impact in the whole industry.