Garments and textiles

Riot police and groups of men in plain clothes armed with sticks, Tasers and slingshots violently attacked a group of anti-eviction protesters conducting a hunger strike at Wat Phnom late last night, injuring several people. Protesters from Phnom Penh’s Boeng Kak community began the hunger strike ...

Cambodia’s garment industry, the kingdom’s largest income maker, recorded 3.65 billion U.S. dollars in export value in the first eight months of the year, up 21 percent from 3.01 billion U.S. dollars over the same period last year, the Ministry of Commerce said Friday. Cambodian ...

Because of ongoing strikes and an inability to fill orders, SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) says it is shedding cash flow as buyers shift away from one of Asia’s largest producers, factory management confirmed yesterday. International brands H&M and Gap reduced their orders, while Levi’s ceased buying ...

A Kampong Speu judge released the vice-president and a member of the Free Trade Union on bail yesterday after the court questioned the two about their alleged roles in a violent demonstration at Sabrina Garment factory. ...

By the time London Fashion Week comes to a close, 58 high-end designers will have shown their collections. Rail-thin models will have walked the runways. Debate will have raged over size zero. In Cambodia, meanwhile, garment workers stitching clothes that supply the UK high street are ...

The Ministry of Social Affairs on Friday established four sub-committees tasked with finding a new minimum wage for the country’s 300,000-plus garment factory workers, Minister Ith Sam Heng said on Friday. “The sub-committees have a limited time of five weeks for research before they have to ...

Four subcommittees formed by the Ministry of Social Affairs met on Friday to begin establishing a new minimum wage for garment workers that will go into effect next year. Following the meeting, Social Affairs Minister Ith Sam Heng told reporters that factory production rates, garment worker ...

Union workers and leaders appeared divided yesterday on the question of whether to support the opposition party’s planned three-day demonstration at Freedom Park. Campaign promises from the Cambodia National Rescue Party to raise minimum monthly salaries to $150 seemed to have struck a chord with garment ...

A joint committee designed to bring about wage increases in the garment sector will meet for the first time on Friday, a Ministry of Social Affairs letter obtained yesterday states. Ath Thorn, president of the Coalition of Cambodian Apparel Workers’ Democratic Union, said he believed ...

Labor activists at the bi-annual Buyers Forum in Phnom Penh on Thursday said that short-term contracts in Cambodia’s garment industry were fueling the high number of strikes affecting the industry. “Most of [the disputes] are over dismissals or dismissals of union leaders and the reason why ...

Around 4000 Cambodian garment workers are protesting after a factory supplying global brands including Gap and H&M fired hundreds of their colleagues for striking over conditions. Union leaders said the Singapore-owned SL Garment Processing factory fired 720 workers on Wednesday while more than 5000 others were ...

Nearly 50 workers, including a woman who is seven months pregnant, fainted at a clothing factory in Phnom Penh’s Por Sen Chey district yesterday due to poor ventilation, union officials and labour-rights groups said. The 47 employees at Wanshen Clothing (Cambodia) Co collapsed at about 3pm, ...

Management at one of Asia’s largest garment producers yesterday fired at least 600 employees, days after thousands returned to work following a two-week strike. Most of the workers fired by SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) Ltd – which supplies Gap, Levi’s and H&M – were members of ...

Cambodia’s biggest international garment brands met yesterday to discuss wage issues, strikes and worker conditions, among other of the industry’s most pressing topics. But in a year marked by a fatal building collapse at the Wing Star Shoes factory in Kampong Speu, mass demonstrations, and bankruptcies ...

Calls for big-name apparel brands to take more responsibility for working conditions in Cambodian garment factories are growing louder as representatives of retail companies ranging from H&M to Wal-Mart arrive in Phnom Penh for a semi-annual buyers’ forum this week. Since it began three years ...

Since her husband was arrested in June and thrown in provincial prison to await trial, Soam Chantha, 32, has given birth to a baby boy. At the same time the men have been locked up, police have failed to arrest former Bavet governor Chhouk Bandith, ...

After nearly 50 garment workers were killed last year while travelling to or from their respective factories, the Ministry of Labour has urged truck drivers who cram dozens into the back of vehicles each day to take more care on the roads. In an information session ...

Blinded, bloodied and barely conscious, two unionists who were nearly beaten to death after passing out pro-union literature in front of a Phnom Penh garment factory remained in their hospital beds yesterday, awaiting a possible transferral to Vietnam. The vicious attack in front of Dayup ...

Thousands of striking garment workers are set to return to work today, as more than two weeks of demonstrations at one of Asia’s largest garment factories come to a close. Meas Sotha, a shareholder at SL Garment Processing (Cambodia) Ltd, and Kong Athit, vice president of ...

In response to a growing number of strikes in the country’s highly profitable garment sector, the government trained 15 handpicked commune officials yesterday to mediate and resolve factory disputes. The training was designed to teach commune councillors to defuse and resolve conflict, Buth Ji, director of ...

Shouting their demands and trying to force their way through the gate, thousands of striking garment workers rallied in front of the Ministry of Social Affairs to no avail yesterday. The strikes came the morning after management posted a notice saying some 6,000 striking workers ...

Union representatives who claim they were beaten to within an inch of their lives yesterday after they handed out pro-union leaflets in Phnom Penh’s Por Sen Chey district have vowed to take legal action. The 10 union members, who represent four different unions – the Union ...

Although the Svay Rieng Provincial Court announced the ex-governor’s sentence in June and ordered his immediate arrest, he has remained elusive to the authorities. His lawyers filed an appeal in July to the Appeal Court challenging the provincial court’s verdict. Sun Bunnarith, Chhouk Bundith’s lawyer, claimed ...

Cambodia’s strongman Prime Minister Hun Sen on Wednesday warned garment workers that protests demanding higher wages could push manufacturers to quit the country. His appeal came after unions last week said hundreds of workers had been fired from a factory making sportswear for US giant Nike ...