Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein accused of ‘labor abuses’ in Ethiopian factories


Mereja.com

Hawassa Industrial Park, Ethiopia’s first industrial park which opened in 2015 employees thousands of Ethiopians. IPDC’s flagship project, Hawassa Industrial Park, is located 275 km from Addis and has more than 15 global leading apparel and textile companies from USA, China, India, Sri Lanka, and 6 other local companies operating in it. Fashion giant PVH, which owns Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein some of the companies operating in the park. As a response to current accusations that Ethiopian workers who make clothes for their high-street stores routinely face verbal abuse and discrimination and earn as little as 12 cents per hour, the companies promised to investigate and solve the issue.

According to a report by the U.S.-based Workers Rights Consortium (WRC), which monitors labor conditions worldwide, workers in PVH supplier factories in Ethiopia are also forced to do unpaid overtime and lose pay for drinking water at their work stations. There have been complaints from workers about wages and working conditions at the park. It is to remember that just last month thousands of workers in Hawassa industrial park stopped their work due to lack of response to their problems low salary, unsafe working environment and being exposed to sexual abuses and abduction.