Public outrage is mounting in China over allegations that a major state-owned food company has been cutting costs by using the same tankers to carry fuel and cooking oil – without cleaning them in between.
The scandal, which implicates China’s largest grain storage and transport company Sinograin, and private conglomerate Hopefull Grain and Oil Group, has raised concerns of food contamination in a country rocked in recent decades by a string of food and drug safety scares – and evoked harsh criticism from Chinese state media.
It was an “open secret” in the transport industry that the tankers were doing double duty, according to a report in the state-linked outlet Beijing News last week, which alleged that trucks carrying certain fuel or chemical liquids were also used to transport edible liquids such as cooking oil, syrup and soybean oil, without proper cleaning procedures.
As far as I’m aware it’s not a requirement. They’re there to make money and the company barracks are cheap. Students in the US also aren’t required to live in dormitories, but more often than not they do.
Sorry… are you comparing student dorms with factory barracks? What shithole college did you go to?
I’m not American. I lived in a flat when studying. From what I’ve heard you can’t even cook in US student dorms that’d be an absolute no-go for me. Also, roommates are required and you get no choice in who that’s going to be.
But maybe a better comparison would be to bunks on an oil rig… with the difference that Foxconn workers aren’t required to sleep in barracks, they’re free to sleep elsewhere. No such option on an oil rig. You also see temporary accommodation on larger construction sites. Or farmers offering bunk-beds to seasonal workers.
Sorry, you’re now comparing permanent living conditions to temporary accommodations? Accommodations which are actually nicer than what Foxconn provides?
Oil rig living quarters:
Foxconn living quarters:
Yes, practically the same.
People don’t work long at Foxconn. Poor, rural Chinese get a job at those kinds of places to have money to settle down somewhere else, to open a small business, to re-invest into the family farm, whatnot. They’re thinking “I need this and this much money to open a noodle shop, if I live in barracks It’s going to take me X months to have the money together, if I rent an apartment X+Y months”, and then they do it.
The whole migratory worker thing is a Chinese phenomenon, feel free to criticise it but most of that criticism should be directed at the CCP who are under-investing into rural areas at the expense of a couple of big, centralised, developments.
Also how often do I have to repeat “employees are not required to live in barracks” until you acknowledge it. In fact, I’m going to answer nothing but that until you say it in your own words.
How much is tuition in that place the dorm picture is from? I bet just living in the dorms is more than Chinese minimum wage.
I like how you just disregard everything that you are saying that turns out not to be true as if you never said it.
Here’s something about their “voluntarily” staying in those barracks:
https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jun/18/foxconn-life-death-forbidden-city-longhua-suicide-apple-iphone-brian-merchant-one-device-extract
Quite the choice they’re given there. Bunkers with eight to a room or bills they can’t afford to pay.
I can’t wait for you to ignore this like you’ve ignored everything else. Or maybe you’ll dismiss this as Western imperialist propaganda?
Yes. That’s one of the things you can criticise Foxconn for. Do it. Though they’re certainly not the only company in China who are fucking over employees, making false or misleading promises, etc. China does not have rule of law, grease some party hands and you can get away with a hell a lot of illegal behaviour.
Also where in that article does it say that Foxconn would force people to live in the barracks. Not paying workers properly is one thing, actual slave labour, keeping people against their will etc. will cause the party to crack down on your operation, hard. Only they are allowed to do that.
Do you take me for a tankie? Count the number me and you criticised the CCP in this thread and compare, please.
Do you understand what a false choice is? The choice is either live in the barracks or pay bills they can’t afford to pay.
Foxconn is not the municipal water supplier, the one you’d be dealing with if you don’t live in those barracks. Those high water bills are if you live in the “free” barracks, i.e. they’re fooling people into thinking the barracks are free (yay! I can keep all of my wages!) and then they’re getting billed for the shower by the litre or something. It’s scummy but TBH also quintessentially Chinese. Their roommates are probably telling them they’re stupid for believing Foxconn.
And if minimum wage doesn’t suffice to have your own regular apartment, with non-extortionary water prices – well, complain with the CCP. Though, I have to add as a smug European, working full-time and not being able to make rent is also very much a thing in the US.