Forced Labour
Please join the #ForcedLaborFashion call-out by clicking the link below and completing the list of action items you can partake in.
Project - Forced Labor
Place pressure on companies complicit in forced labour
Purpose: To reach out to companies who have supply chains in China that may be complicit in forced labor and place pressure on them to make the move away from these unethical practices.
Method: Copy the letter below, or in this Google Doc, edit or add anything to make it personal to you, and send it to the company's email. Show public outrage and demand accountability!
Background: The article Uyghurs for Sale provides information about Uyghur camp detainees and others who "graduate" into forced labor factories, which are used by global companies for fast fashion. A more condensed or summarised version can be found here. You can see results from public pressure on companies here. More companies can be found in this earlier article by ChinaFile as well.
Letters to different companies: Google Doc
SAMPLE LETTER TO NIKE
EMAIL TO:
SUBJECT: Stop Nike’s Use of Forced Labor in China
Dear Mr. Director General,
As you are aware, nearly three million Uyghur Muslims are detained in camps in China. Tens of thousands of them are enslaved for the benefit of suppliers to large international companies.
A recent report by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute demonstrated that world-famous brands, including yours, are a part of this.
According to the report, in early 2020, about 600 workers consisting of mainly Uyghur women from Hotan and Kashgar, were working at Qingdao Taekwang Shoes Co. Ltd, whose main customer is Nike, Inc. According to the report, Uyghurs laborers make shoes by day, and “receive ‘vocational training’ and ‘patriotic education’” by night. These types of practices, combined with other kinds of mass suppression of Uyghurs by the Chinese government meet U.N. criteria for genocide.
As a company that claims that it “has strict requirements in [its] Code of Conduct prohibiting any type of forced, bonded or indentured labor at supplier facilities,” I would like to know what measures you are taking to stop this abjectness. Adidas and Lacoste have pledged to cut forced Uyghur labor from their supply chains, and I expect Nike to take concrete steps to cut forced labor from its supply chains.
I am boycotting all of your products until concrete steps are taken, including proof and documentation of said steps, since I don’t want to be a part of this. Nike’s current statement is not enough.
Regards,
[YOUR NAME]
Further Action
Thank you to the friends who have taken the time to create this letter!
Follow Atlas Now on Instagram for more info and action items. EN, DE, AR, TR
You can also follow Raphael Glucksmann MEP whose team is in the process talking to companies that are complicit in forced labor - FR, EN
Join the Coalition to End Forced Labor here.
Youth for Climate Paris have begun an awareness campaign by replacing the tags of implicated brands with a more informative one. Learn more about how to join the campaign through their Instagram page.
Check out the link below for ways you can join the #FreeUyghur company call out campaign.