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Alamode agreed to pay minimum wages, provide back pay, enroll all workers in the Honduran social security system to give them access to health care, paid injury leave and other benefits, and establish an injury log as required.
However, other issues remained unresolved, including:
-- further improvement of health and safety issues;
-- ending verbal harassment; and
-- making overtime work voluntary, not mandatory.
Despite improvements, Alamode workers still earn sub-poverty wages, and full compliance with labor rights falls far short.
The Mexican Vaqueros Navarra Factory
The factory produces jeans and uniforms, including the Dickies brand. In May 2007, its workers tried to form a union but faced extreme harassment and intimidation, as reported by a labor rights monitor on the scene. It's investigation:
"found that workers had been psychologically and verbally harassed, dismissed without warning, and forced to sign resignation letters for attempting to form an independent union at the factory and that at least some workers dismissed for union activities have been blacklisted....the official reason given for workers dismissed....was 'lack of work.' "
Two months after voting to affiliate with the Garment Workers Union, employees were told the plant shut down for lack of work. Yet three buyers, Gap, Warnaco, and American Eagle, placed orders with the factory in support of their right to organize.
In July 2008, the Tehuacan Valley Human and Labor Rights Commission filed a complaint with WRC alleging that another Navarra Group factory, Confecciones Mazara, discriminated in its hiring practices. WRC investigated and found "overwhelming evidence that Confecciones Mazara engaged in unlawful discrimination against union supporters in hiring decisions, otherwise known as 'blacklisting.' "
Twenty former Vaqueros Navarra workers applying for jobs were rejected. Another initially hired was fired on her first day after her former union organizing activities were discovered. In response to WRC complaints, the company refused to comply and continues its blacklisting practices.
The Dominican Republic's Suprema Manufacturing, Wholly Owned by Propper International (PI)
It operates three plants and employs about 1,000 workers making uniforms and other apparel items. PI is one of the largest makers of US military clothing. In 2008, Suprema Manufacturing's employees described low wages, high production quotas, unhealthy work conditions, and extreme hardships, all unaddressed by the company.
At the same time, PI distributed a threatening notice to its Puerto Rico workforce accusing the union and workforce of defamation. The same notice said that SweatFree Communities' publications expressed "a defamatory tone toward Propper (alleging) that the Department of Defense is subsidizing companies with terrible work conditions, and safety and human rights violations." The notice concluded saying:
"SAY NO TO THE UNION. DON'T SIGN ANOTHER CARD."
