Third report on working conditions in the Mexican electronics industry
CEREAL’s new report examines the labour conditions of Mexican workers who, hidden in the supplier chain of the electronics industry, make the mobile phones of Nokia, Xbox videogames stations for Microsoft, hardware for IBM’s businesses , Lenovo’s docking stations, Hewlett Packard printers, Dell’s servers and speakers and TVs for Panasonic. Through testimonies workers in the electronics industry in Mexico tell us at firsthand about their experiences of uncertainty, employment instability, humiliating treatment and overwork.
CEREAL’s new report examines the labour conditions of Mexican workers who, hidden in the supplier chain of the electronics industry, make the mobile phones of Nokia, Xbox videogames stations for Microsoft, hardware for IBM’s businesses , Lenovo’s docking stations, Hewlett Packard printers, Dell’s servers and speakers and TVs for Panasonic. Through testimonies workers in the electronics industry in Mexico tell us at firsthand about their experiences of uncertainty, employment instability, humiliating treatment and overwork. There are 10 emblematic cases chosen from a universe of almost 4000 stories that CEREAL heard directly from the workers in 2008 and 2009. Many of these cases happened in the context of economic crisis, which was used by some electronics companies to make the already very precarious labour conditions of the workers in this sector even worse. At the end of 2009, while the companies in Mexico reactivate production and attract new investments, many workers see their wages going down and temporary contracts shortening. In the end, the workers were the ones who had to pay the greater part of the costs of the crisis. read more less
