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A feature that is advantageous to Chinese exporters is that their employees work an
average of 57 hours per week, with only five days annual leave, earning in the region of
R100 – R200 per week (CloTrade Annual Report 2005). Comparing this with South Africa’s
2005 Gazetted wages of “R550 for a 45 hour week and R283 for the same hours in non-
urban areas”, according to a survey undertaken by the Natal Clothing Manufacturers’
Association in 2005 (Payne, 2005). The KwaZulu-Natal Chamber of the National Bargaining
Council Clothing Manufacturing Industry provided figures in October 2006 indicating that
the wage rate for the period 1 September 2006 to 31 August 2007 for Metro areas is R567
per week for a 45-hour week - an increase of R17-00 from 2005, equating to R2 268-00 per
month. A media report in October 2006 stated a survey published by Cosatu’s research
department Naladi in 2005 showed that the average worker in the clothing and textile
industries was earning R870.00 a month way below the household subsistence levels in
urban centres.
It should be noted that this wage of R2 268 per month (taking the September 2006 figures
cited by the KwaZulu-Natal’s Chamber of the National Bargaining Council) exceeds that
cited in the University of Port Elizabeth’s 2001 study of household subsistence levels in the
major urban centres of the Republic of South Africa. The figure for Durban cited in this
study was R1 432-85 (Skinner and Valodia, 2004: 15). An update of the 2001 study showed
that that national household subsistence level in September 2004 was R2130.56 (Potgieter,
2004:62).
These discrepancies between the two countries’ wage policies do not constitute an
argument for South African wages in the clothing sector to be lowered to meet or
undercut those of China. There are other alternatives which have been proposed for the
South African industry, such as investment in technology, and greater flexibility in
production processes to meet the challenges posed by cheap imports.
Even though there are safeguards in place that can be evoked by importing countries in
adhering to the policies set for a post-ATC environment (ILO, 2005: 8) such as South
Africa’s, were China’s growth to create serious market upheavals within the importing
country, the South African labour ministry has said that it will not evoke these restrictions, as
South Africa needs to look at the “totality of our relationship with China … it is much
broader than just clothing” (D’Angelo and Bloomberg, 2005).
A further threat to South Africa represented by current trade relations with China is the
proposed Free Trade Agreement (FTA) between the two countries, which could allow a
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