{"id":47526,"date":"2021-06-16T19:38:00","date_gmt":"2021-06-16T19:38:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dev6.blazedream.in\/ICSF\/samudra\/mucho-moolah-sweatshop-standards"},"modified":"2021-08-19T05:38:10","modified_gmt":"2021-08-19T05:38:10","slug":"mucho-moolah-sweatshop-standards","status":"publish","type":"samudra","link":"https:\/\/www.icsf.net\/samudra\/mucho-moolah-sweatshop-standards\/","title":{"rendered":"Mucho Moolah, Sweatshop Standards"},"content":{"rendered":"

Chile : Salmon Aquaculture<\/span><\/p>\n

Mucho Moolah, Sweatshop Standards<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Despite being a jewel in the crown of Chile’s export economy, the salmon aquaculture industry is plagued by poor workplace and labour standards<\/span><\/p>\n

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This article by Brian O’Riordan<\/b> (briano@scarlet.be<\/a>) has been compiled from various sources<\/em><\/span><\/p>\n

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The salmon industry is one of the jewels in the crown of Chile’s export economy, which has grown at an average annual rate of 15 per cent over the last 15 years. Although production has stagnated in the last couple of years, the value of exports has not. In 2006, salmon exports reached US<\/span><\/span>$2.2 bn, up 28 per cent over 2005, despite a fall in production. Projections for 2007 predict earnings in excess of US<\/span><\/span>$2.5 bn, assuming that demand increases will be sustained in the international markets, which take 98 per cent of Chile’s farmed salmon production. <\/span><\/p>\n

The Los Lagos (Xth) Region is Chile’s salmon centre, concentrated around Puerto Montt and the island of Chiloe, producing over 90 per cent of Chile’s salmon and employing around 50,000 people, some 60 per cent being women. <\/span><\/p>\n

But gradually salmon-growing and export-processing facilities are being established further south in Chile’s most southerly, least populated, most isolated regions, where pristine environmental conditions provide ideal growing conditions.<\/span><\/p>\n

But working in Chile’s salmon aquaculture sector entails dangers to health and safety, and has led to some fatalities. Using data from the Chilean Navy, the Labour Directorate, and the governments of the Los Lagos and Ais\u00e9n Regions, the non-governmental organization, Centro Ecoceanos, has recorded that between February 2005 and April 2007, 42 workers in the aquaculturemainly salmonindustry have been killed at work, or have gone missing, presumed dead. <\/span><\/p>\n

They were engaged as divers (to inspect, maintain and repair cages), salmon feeders, workers who maintained and serviced the salmon cages and related infrastructure, security guards, and feed-plant and fish-plant processing workers. <\/span><\/p>\n

Most of the workers are in the export-processing plants, where, according to Directorate of Work data, 91 per cent of the tasks are carried out by women, many being single parents. They work shifts, both day and night. Fewer workers are engaged in the rearing centres. <\/span><\/p>\n

Safety standards<\/span><\/strong><\/p>\n

Centro Ecoceanos alleges that in most cases, the high death toll could have been avoided if health-and-safety standards had not been compromised, and if proper training and equipment had been provided. While the salmon industry in Chile might be a giant in the export sector, reporting First-World earnings, it seems that Third-World standards are applied to working conditions and environmental regulation, says Juan Carlos Cardenas, Director, Centro Ecoceanos. <\/span><\/p>\n

Cardenas points out that multinationals own 36 per cent of Chilean salmon-producing companies, but apply double standards in Chile that contravene the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD<\/span><\/span>) Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises. These are designed to promote corporate social and environmental responsibility, and deal with employment and industrial relations, human rights, environment, information disclosure, bribery, consumer interests, science and technology, competition and taxation.<\/span><\/p>\n

Noteworthy among the multinational companies is Marine Harvest, the biggest corporation operating in Chile, bought by Norwegian billionaire John Fredriksen on 6 March 2006 for Euro1.175 bn. Unfortunately, the record of Marine Harvest shows a big gap between the standards applied in Norway and Chile. Marine Harvest has incurred a long list of penalties for not complying with the labour laws. The report of the National Labour Directorate, given to the Chamber of Deputies’ Fisheries Committee for its \u0091salmon review’, details some 80 fines applied by the Inspectors of Work in the Xth Region, with amounts totalling more than 63 mn pesos. <\/span><\/p>\n

In a letter dated 1 June 2007 to Sven Aaser, the Group Chief Executive of Marine Harvest, representatives of Chile’s salmon workers pointed out that many workers in Chile’s salmon industry receive wages of around US<\/span><\/span>$285 or Euro210 per month, that more than half have no life insurance coverage, and that more than three-quarters have no disability insurance.<\/span><\/p>\n

On 14 December 2005, Javier Vel\u00e1squez Mill\u00e1n, aged 24, died following an accident at work at Marine Harvest’s Chamiza plant. According to the accident report, Vel\u00e1squez was carrying out his duties normally. A forklift truck passing close to where he was working tipped over because the floor was not level. The load it was carrying fell on him, killing him immediately. According to his workmates, Velazquez was not provided with any protection. The accident report further states that the surface on which the truck was working was not safe for operation without risk. <\/span><\/p>\n

In August 2006, two senior executives at the Marine Harvest Chamiza plant were charged with involuntary homicide for their part in the accident. Simultaneously, the family of the victim mounted a claim for compensation. Despite the progress made in the case, according to Jaime Gatica, the lawyer acting for the deceased worker’s family, \u0093Marine Harvest has tried to evade and minimize its responsibility in the accident. It has not behaved in a direct or transparent way. This transnational has shown zero corporate social responsibility. To date, Marine Harvest has refused to pay any compensation to the family of the deceased worker, and has not admitted any liability in this and other accidents at work.<\/span><\/p>\n

Based on this and similar incidents, Cardenas calls for a wide-ranging discussion on the real environmental, economic and social costs of salmon farming in Chile, and a review of alternative models of aquaculture that could serve to establish more democratic and socially just production systems that promote environmental sustainability and cultural diversity. Without such a process, Cardenas believes, the Los Lagos, Ais\u00e9n and Magallanes Regions (Regions X, XI and XII) could be transformed into a kind of \u0091salmon republic’, with laws dictated by feudal salmon bosses to maximize offshore profits, leaving a social and environmental desert in their wake.<\/span><\/p>\n

Official statistics reveal a high rate of accidents at work in the Los Lagos Region, where 90 per cent of Chile’s salmon is produced. In 2005, accident rates were 11.2 per cent in the rearing units and 13.9 per cent in the processing plants, far above the national average of 7.96 per cent for industrial workers. According to industry sources, 73 per cent of accidents occur in the processing plants, 19 per cent on marine sites, and 5 per cent in the feed plants. Centro Ecoceanos says that the maritime authorities acknowledge that only 5 per cent of the accidents and illnesses suffered by divers operating in the salmon industry are reported.<\/span><\/p>\n

Over the last few years, according to the National Directorate for Labour, two-thirds of the salmon companies in the Xth Region have violated the labour laws. During 2003-2005, a total of 572 programmed inspections were carried out, 404 of which resulted in fines, equivalent to a violation rate of 70 per cent. <\/span><\/p>\n

The main violations relate to:<\/span><\/p>\n