Cities in Northern Morocco are attractive to Spanish investors and they are the second largest source of foreign investment in the region. Spanish investment is particularly significant in the production sector and provides the capital for 37% of registered companies. These employ a third of the workforce. Because of this link to the region, the Spanish CCC (Campaña Ropa Limpia) carried out research to learn more about working conditions in garment-producing factories and workshops.

The Spanish CCC has produced an in-depth report, "La moda, un teijdo de injustices" (Fashion, a fabric of injustice), which charts the historical and geographic links between Morocco and Spain, examines the growth of the garment industry and analyzes the role that Spanish companies have played. It presents the stark reality for the many thousands of workers (mainly women) who work in the small sub-contracted workshops supplying Spanish (and other European) companies.

How the Spanish companies operate

The report looks at the different ways major Spanish companies - Corte Inglés, Mayoral, Inditex (Zara) and Mango - source their garments from Northern Morocco, principally in Tangier. Companies have subsidiaries, invest in Moroccan companies and contract Moroccan companies to manufacture part of their production. There is also widespread sub-contracting through small companies or workshops.

Sub-contracting and workers' rights violations

The researchers found that many of the workshops were illegal and almost all had no affiliation to the CNSS (National Social Security Fund). They were making no social security payments on behalf of their workers, thus depriving them of any legal protection or health insurance.

The concept of maximum working hours did not exist and depended solely on the current orders. This meant that workers could be working a typical 10 hours a day, and then all night, to meet deadlines for orders. Most of these workers are women and adolescents who are legally only allowed to work 8 hours a day between 5am and 10pm. In addition, if these workers receive any overtime payments at all, it is at the standard rate and not at the legally recognized higher rates. In addition, workers employed in these unregulated workshops reported frequent sexual harassment to CCC researchers who also visited small workshops in poorly ventilated, badly lit, underground garages where the heat from irons and machines was suffocating.

Women, children and union members suffer most

Men employing women in workshops told researchers they were:"more meticulous in their work and more reliable than men, but above all they are less aggressive in their demands."

Many women have no choice but to work in the unregulated sub-contracting sector. Most have migrated from the countryside, have little or no education and need the money for their families. Pay rates are so low, some resort to prostitution to cover the families' basic needs.

Morocco has signed ILO Convention 182 on the Worst Forms of Child Labour, but not number 138 related to child exploitation which establishes a minimum age for children to work. Under national legislation, children can be employed from age 12.

Working conditions, wages and job security are much worse for children than for adults in the sub-contracting sector and, if they ever get a salary, the wages are not more than 3 Dirham/hour (27 Euro cents). Moroccan labour legislation recognises the right of all workers to join a trade union. However, trade unions in the garment sector are almost non-existent in any type of company. Researchers found that membership of a trade union meant dismissal.

The responsibility of Spanish companies

Spanish companies in Tangier operate in two ways. There are those owning production premises and those who sub-contract. The researchers note that those in the first category do comply with Moroccan legislation whereas those who use sub-contractors do not. The sub-contracting (irregular) sector survives by almost exclusively supplying European brands. Most Spanish companies site their factories in free trade zones and reap the financial benefits but then use the sub-contractors, scattered through-out Tangier in a variety of ways.

The report compares the activities of the Spanish companies with the general law of economic globalization: they shed their production responsibilities and make them the problem of those providing the end product, i.e. the workers. The end result is more workshops employing people in illegal working conditions and more exploitation. The Spanish CCC is looking at possibilities to expand their work to other regions of Morocco. Please look at their website for information on progress, and for a copy of the complete report in Spanish, or the summary report in English, http://www.ropalimpia.org/.