Land Centre for Human Rights has issued a report on the conditions of Egyptian textile and garment workers. The sector of spinning, weaving and garment is among the most important industrial sectors in Egypt. This has much to do with the fact that this industry is one of the oldest and most labour-intensive ones. It employs around one million workers distributed over some 4000 public and private factories. The industry of spinning and weaving is now going through a major crisis threatening its entire future. The report shows the hurdles facing the industry and their effects on the working and living conditions of its workers, as well as the latter's actions of militancy against the repercussions of neo-liberalism.
The first section deals with the history of spinning and weaving workers. It starts with Mohammed Ali's modern State up to the end of Nasser's era. The foundation of Misr Spinning and Weaving Company in 1927 was a milestone in terms of the growth of the industry. This move was followed by establishing a host of big factories working the in the field of spinning and weaving. Workers in this sector played the leading role in the flourishing Egyptian labour movement of the 1940s.
The second section refers to the conditions of spinning, weaving, and garment workers under the marker-oriented economic policy the Egyptian State has adopted since the mid-1970s. The major changes the Egyptian economy has undergone over the past three decades had deep effects on the industry. Among the most important effects was the decline of the weigh of public enterprises working in the field of spinning and weaving. In so far as it proved difficult to privatise these companies due to the burden of intensive labour, the government adopted a policy to liquidate these companies through immersing them in debts. A host of moves have been taken in pursuit of such goal. Firstly, the government stopped investing in upgrading the equipment and production techniques. Secondly, the liberalisation of cotton trade dealt a blow to the industry of textile and garment. Within the framework of the privatisation programme, four companies in the field of spinning, weaving and garments were privatised and other four were liquidated.
On the other hand, the industry's structure witnessed significant changes. The concentration of production was shifted from traditional centres in Mahalla al-Kubra and Shubra Al-Kheima to new industrial cities such as the 6th of October and 10th of Ramadan. Moreover, a tendency to depend of female labour force became strongly apparent. The expansion in terms of garment industry over the past two decades boosted the weight of female labour force, which now constitutes up to 90% of workforce in garment industry. As for weaving, the contribution of female workers does not exceed 30%. Spinning depends mainly on male workers because of the hardship associated with this field. Most female workers are 17-25 years old and they perform all the tasks of garment.
The free-market economy had massive effects on workers in spinning, weaving and garment industry. Workers in public enterprises, for their part, were subject to a decline in real wages from 100 in 1968 to 61 in 1994. By the same token, real wages in 1999 were less than those in 1985. On the other hand, companies' expenditure on services (including healthcare, housing and transportation) considerably declined.
As for privately-owned enterprises, the situation is much worse. In light of the neo-liberal policy, the unified labour law was passed in 2003 to grant employers full freedom to hire and fire. Working conditions in private factories are appalling. Working hours reach 12 daily and standards of wages are so low. In some mills, average wage was as low as LE 200—according to data of 2005. Safety measure and healthcare are absent in most factories.
Workers' attempt to form a union represents a grave mistake that might cost them there jobs. In the city of Mahalla, with its hundreds of privately-owned factories, a single union hardly exists.
The third section shows workers' protests in the field of spinning, weaving and garment over the three decades that witnessed the implementation of a market-oriented economic policy. Despite the ups and downs, workers of textile and garment played an important role in the protests taking place in this period. Over the 1970s, they performed a leading role in workers movement. The 1980s and 1990s, however, were marked by a decline in their role, in favour of in chemical and metal workers. Yet textile and garment workers regained their position as the vanguard of the workers movement in the latest protest wave starting from 2005 onwards.
Workers protests could be divided into three phases: 1980-1989, 1990-2004 and 2005-present. Such division is based upon the changes experienced by Egyptian capitalism and workers reaction to these changes over the nearly 30-year period.
The forth section contains case studies for three mills in the city of Mehalla. The first is a public mill: Misr Spinning and Weaving Company; the second is a private mill: Al-Samouli; and the third is Al-Sayyad, a garment mill depending mainly on female labour force. The field research focuses on three areas: working conditions, resistance and consciousness and female labour force.
Interviews with workers' leaders in Misr Spinning and Weaving Company tackled the strike that engulfed the company in 2006 and 2007 and the crisis of April 2008. It was found that among the hardships suffered by workers is that they usually have to work seven days a week to compensate for low wage standards, the expansion of punitive measures on the part of management, and the lack of safety measures. As for the union elections held in 2006, they were totally rigged and brought unionist non-representative of workers' interests. The experience of workers' struggle showed the following: 1-strikes' leaders emerged spontaneously out of the movement. 2-strikes focused on demands related to working conditions. 3-the great majority of strikers had nothing to do with politics. 4-political parties and forces had no tangible influence on the workers movement. 5-females workers stood side by side with their male counterparts 6-the strikes challenged for the first time in more than 50 years State's control over the unions as more than 10,000 workers signed appeals to withdraw confident from the company's union. 7-the disagreement among leaders on what to do on 6 April 2008 – which was announced by some forces as a date of civil disobedience— created a state of confusion among workers and enabled the government to paralyse workers' movement and arrest some leaders.
Samouli mill has some 2500 workers, and daily working hours are as long as 12. There are three wage categories. Foremen and workers in weaving get more than LE 1000 a month. Around 25% of workers receive LE 750 a month. The rest of workers (representing 50%) receive no more than LE 250 a month.
Similar to 90% of textile and garment mills in Egypt, Samouli lacks safety measures. When workers attempted to form a union in 2003, the management aborted the move and fired the involved workers.
Al-Sayyad is specialised in garment and has 1200 workers, most of whom are females. The wage of the newcomer is LE 215 and after five years, wage reaches LE 550 including bonuses. In addition to low wage standards, female workers suffer form maltreatment as insults and humiliation are integral part of the work process. More often than not, workers are forced to work on Friday and the factory has no nursery in violation of law. The factory has no union and the management does not abide by government's decisions concerning annual rises in wages. Workers thought of staging a strike more than once to protest against violations committed by the management thought no actual move was taken in this respect.
The conclusion refers to the following points:
1-The industry of textile and garment has been subject for more than three decades to a major crisis that threatens its future altogether.
2-The result of such crisis was a massive decline in terms of the number of public sector workers involved in the industry, while private sector workers grew in number. The industry experienced structural changes over the same period.
3-The role of textile and garment workers in the labour movement retreated in the 1980s and 1990s due to the contraction witnessed by the industry.
4-Within the framework of the rising labour movement over the past three years, textile and garment workers regained their role in spearheading the movement that expanded to include wide sectors of industrial and services workers. This has much to do with the fact that this is an intensive labour sector whose workers suffer from appalling working conditions.
5-It is apparent that the current workers movement is far from being politicised. Protests erupted spontaneously and political forces and parties have no influence on them. This has much to do with the chronic weakness of the left. As for the Muslim Brotherhood, its conservative orientation and dependence on the middle rather than working classes prevented it from interfering in the movement.
6-A new generation of rank and file workers that believes in the worthiness of resistance emerged.
7-The current workers' movement questioned for the first time in five decades State's control over trade unions when Mahalla and tax workers started to pursue independent unions. Yet the goal of union plurality still faces many hurdles and it needs a wider and stronger workers movement to be materialised.
8-The movement of textile workers has a major point of weakness: its isolation from the rest of the working class. If the movement is to improve and make further successes, creating forms of cooperation among different sectors of the working class seems a matter of life or death.