Garment factory redundancies hit all time high in 2009
18 Feb '10
1 min read
The Ministry of Labour has released statistics suggesting that 106 garment and footwear producing factories closed down in the previous year, making over 45,000 workers redundant.
Apart from this 66 other factories had suspended production leaving 38,124 workers temporarily job-less. But the silver lining is that, in 2009, 48 new garment manufacturing units were set up, generating employment for 16,886 workers.
The government took up the initiative to provide these unemployed workers training in other trades like agriculture, etc., and in the process provided training to 40,000 workers due to which, they could take up remunerative employment.
Cambodian clothing sector was hit hard by the economic turmoil and more so due to the fact that, its biggest buyer; USA was the epicenter of the crisis. Exports from the sector slid 15.8 percent year-on-year in 2009.
In the middle of all this, workers unions demanded for an increase in wages from US $50 per month to $90 per month, considering that cost of living had gone up and that was the minimum required based on the living costs in the capital of the country.