There is a dilemma which I’ve come across before in my ongoing quest to help make a difference in the world. It begins something like this: you want to take a stand against child labour and sweatshop labour in developing countries. Why should people be mistreated, underpaid, and essentially enslaved to major manufacturing companies so that we can save a couple of bucks in the developed world? So you start looking twice at clothing labels, keeping an eye out for the ubiquitous “Made in China” statement, disdaining companies who try and fool people with a “Designed in the U.S.A.” label (it’s still made in overseas sweatshops!), and searching out fair trade options wherever possible. This is all fine and good, until you hear about a charity which is helping people by selling merchandise (like clothes and other accessories) and giving 100% of the profits to their cause.
This other charity’s cause is also something you’d like to help out with, so you fork over money to buy their merch, delighting in the t-shirt that arrives at your door two weeks later. And then you see it: the “Made in China” tag staring you in the face. Did you just support a sweatshop in one part of the world, to benefit people in another part? Was it worth it?
I’ve definitely sent emails to charities like the one I described above; asking whether or not their merchandise is fair trade. Most of the time, it isn’t. Robbing the poor to feed the poor? It doesn’t really work. And I’ve tried to justify it before by saying that the people being helped by the charity would die without that help (malaria pills, or clean water, or HIV medication), whereas the people in sweatshops will live regardless (albeit, not at the best quality of life possible). But people are people are people, no matter where they are in the world or what they are doing. The 9-year-old girl in the sweatshop deserves to have a happier childhood as much as the HIV-positive baby. So what do you do?
It’s a tough decision. My personal stance has been that I will first write to the charity offering the merchandise, and ask them about the manufacturing cycle of their products. If they are unable to tell me, or try to reassure me that their manufacturing facilities are “quality-checked”, then I will not buy their products. Or if a commercial retail store is selling merchandise to raise money for a cause (may or may not be through a charity), I will first check the label. Location information like “Made in China”, “Made in Bangladesh”, and “Made in Mexico” are fairly reliable indicators of sweatshop labour (as well, “Made in India” is a rather reliable indicator of child labour). Not only that, but merchandise made under such conditions tends to be cheaply constructed, using the cheapest materials possible (think of Stitches/Bluenotes), and is not worth my money anyway if I will have to replace it soon after buying it.
I’m not here to preach. But being mindful of the conditions around the world, and taking into account the entire supply chain when buying a product is something small that can affect things in a big way. For example, if one of the charities you write to is intrigued by the fact that people care where their merchandise comes from, they might look into fair trade and/or local options. If a commercial chain notices that their “Made in Canada” shirts are selling faster than their “Made in China” ones, they will take notice (especially because locally-made merch tends to be more expensive, due to the higher wages and cost of living), and then they might start bringing more of their manufacturing back to North America. It is possible to still be profitable without cutting costs on production– people’s perception of higher-priced products is that they are better quality and will last longer than their cheaper substitutes.
An interesting resource to check out on this topic is the Free2Work Database– they give corporations a grade based on how they treat their workers. Just something to think about.
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