In the Ethiopian highlands, the fertile parts of Ethiopia, landholding size is around a hectare per household. Assuming an average household size of about 6 persons in rural areas, then this would suggest about 600 persons per square kilometer. Even if this number seems at the upper edge, it is undeniable that population pressure is huge, and agricultural productivity (agricultural output/person) is low. Though several opposing theories exist, one suggests that countries should heavily invest into the secondary sector, so that people move out of the rural areas to work in the emerging industries. Because less people are working on the field agricultural productivity would automatically improve.
Ethiopia is a country that is trying this strategy. Lately,
even Swiss free newspaper were announcing that H&M would start producing
low cost cloth in Ethiopia. Having seen horrible images from Bangladesh, where
cloth production is just modern slavery, I am wondering if the industrialization
strategy is a “winner’s curse” ? is Ethiopia becoming a new Bangladesh? Is it
really slavery?
I recently found this movie on internet showing how shoes
and shirts are produced in Ethiopia, by Chinese and Turkish. The movie is
entitled modern slavery, a title I would like to challenge…
L'Ethiopie casse les prix - Escalave moderne par kersanti
In the movie, we see well-built factories with quite good
working conditions. Nothing to compare to the overcrowded badly build factories
in Bangladesh. Ok, we see some women who do not use the right protecting cloth
when gluing shoes, yes it is bad, but “self-employed” smallholders producing
onions also use chemicals without protection. It is bad, but the understanding
of the importance of correct protecting material has not yet reached Ethiopia,
and I would even believe the Chinese bosses who say why should I oblige them,
they would not use it anyway.
Let’s now look at the benefit schemes a worker gets. The
lady that is hired to fold the Aldi t-shirt is earning 50 cent an hour. So let
me make some computation, if she works for 8 hours, she gets 4 dollars. Then
she also gets a free meal, and a free service bus bringing her home (ILRI where
I worked abolished the services bus). Ok, this is not a lot and ok she pays
half of her wage to say in a small room without water and electricity. But
looking at my former’s driver wife. She is running her own small burger place
on a road side near to some condominiums. On good days she makes double than
the girl who folds shirts in the factory, but she does not get a free meal, and
20% of her earnings goes into transportation, she had to invest money and bares risk. Also my cleaning lady was not earning much more per day than the girl folding Aldi shirts, but her days were shorter and she had many more benefits...
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| My former driver's wife running her burger place |
So is it really modern slavery, or is cheap labor just the
comparative advantage of Ethiopia to industrialize and move more and more
people out of poverty? I understand, for us it is a moral question if it is
fair that the Tommy Hilfiger shoes that we pay more than 200 usd are produced
in Ethiopia only for 8 USD. But the clothing industry in Ethiopia is just paying
local wages that by the way are more than double than in the commercial farming
sector (a worker that picks the roses you buy in your supermarkets gets less
than a dollar a day). And workers could walk out of the factories and go back
to their rural homes, yet they stay, because there are no other jobs for
uneducated people that pays as much as the clothing industry. Slavery starts
there where people have no choice than working for low wages (for example
because their passport has been taken away and can’t leave), I don’t think that is (yet) the case in Ethiopia.
Ok these worker might have no choice because they can’t find any other job, but
this applies to many many many other people in the developed world too. Lack of
education and poverty makes them slaves.
I definitely feel that the emerging clothing industry is a
great opportunity for Ethiopia to develop, to lift people out of poverty so
that they are freer in future. Remember that the developed world did not get
rich by preserving nature and human rights. But a critical eye should be kept
on this industry to make sure that we are not getting a second Bangladesh…
Despite of all this, we should not look away from how things
we eat and use are produced. Though, conditions are ok in local terms, it is a
moral issue. Could working
conditions not be improved in such a way that they contribute to a faster
positive change for the Ethiopian society? For example by letting
the industry invest in education and health care? In the end, it is you as a
consumer who decides!
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