Position statement issued on sweat shop’ conditions
The American Industrial Hygiene Association (AIHA) is reaching out to improve workplace environmental health and safety in the world’s sweatshops. "Sweatshop working conditions," as described in the position statement issued recently by the AIHA board of directors, refers to multiple violations of labor, occupational safety and health, and environmental laws. These are the specific types of abuses cited in the accompanying White Paper on Occupational Health, Safety, and Environ-mental Conditions in Sweatshops:
- long work hours without overtime pay;
- wages below the minimum;
- piecework payment or other mechanisms to accelerate work pace;
- child labor;
- prison or forced labor;
- failure to pay social security or other payroll taxes;
- absence of workers’ compensation insurance;
- employment involving indentured servitude or debt;
- payment structures such as company script or hiring fees;
- discrimination based on age, gender, religion, caste, or sexual orientation.
The position statement and white paper have been adopted exactly a year after AIHA established a national Task Force on Health, Safety, and Environmental Conditions in Sweatshops at the initiative of the then president-elect Steven P. Levine, PhD, CIH. IHA will "work in conjunction with local community-based organizations and other nongovernmental organizations having access to and enjoying the confidence of sweatshop workers to ensure all workers are guaranteed basic human rights and economic benefits," according to its position statement.
The companion white paper addresses global economy and working conditions; rights of workers and responsibilities of employers; codes, monitors, and verification; codes of conduct; audits of workplace conditions; and verification of health and safety conditions by independent organizations; the role of industrial hygienists and AIHA; and a nondiscriminatory approach in developing countries.
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