4. Case study: Top Toy, Brio and Coop in China - Swedwatch

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Fair Trade Center’s comments on the ICTI CARE Process 2 The ICTI CARE Process is the international toy industry's ethical manufacturing program. It aims at ensuring that the industry’s code of conduct, the ICTI Code of Business Practices, is followed by toy manufacturers. It is very positive that the toy industry has decided to work together in a sector wide approach to solve the problems. However some areas namely, workers’ participation, responsibility and transparency, are still weak if not absent in the proposed mechanism. We believe that the following issues would strengthen the ICTI initiative. 1. Workers’ Participation The ICTI code contains specific standards regulating working, pay and safety conditions which, if they are to be complied substantially and consistently, require not only a sound management system and documentation, but also support and participation of workers on the shop floor. While day-to-day monitoring of code implementation is impossible, workers on the shop floor are able to control that the code is complied in the long run. The inadequacies of auditing are increasingly being acknowledged and complemented by the workers’ participation approach in other industries and by a number of multi-stakeholder projects. ICTI should learn from this and work towards more workers’ participation in their initiative. 2. Workers’ Education To encourage significant participation of workers in ethical compliance and to make the complaint mechanism a meaningful one, the workforce should be educated and well informed about the ICTI code. This can only be done if workers’ education is integrated on a mandatory and sustainable basis into the ICTI auditing mechanism. The ICTI should lead the industry and assist the member associations, companies and factories to conduct training not only for the management but also for rank and file workers. It should be considered as well to open the auditing mechanism for the participation of concerned labour organisations and unions for constructive input. 3. Responsibility of all companies The proposed ICTI auditing mechanism is based on voluntary application from Asian toy manufacturers and suppliers. They have to pay the full cost of their certification. While the toy factories are the main venue where compliance is measured, their performance is highly related to the buying practices and commitment of the buying companies (brand name companies and retailers from the “North”). Unilateral compliance only on the part of the (Asian) toy factories cannot be sustained. Corrective actions can only be successful with the commitment of the buying companies to review their buying policy (i.e. price pressure and ordering system). The Asian toy manufacturers’ and suppliers’ responsibility is obvious. But these mostly small and medium sized companies might be overtaxed to bear all costs for necessary corrective actions. This leads to the question if these costs should be shared amongst brand name companies and retailers from the “North” and toy manufacturers and suppliers from the “South”. 2 These comments are based on the International Toy Campaign’s comments on the ICTI CARE process. 12
4. Transparency Transparency is an indispensable condition for credibility. Since the implementation of any code of conduct is a process of different steps taken at different times it is imperative to inform the public about steps taken and planned (including the overall timeframe for the steps towards an implementation of the code). Transparency entails giving stakeholders concerned (e.g. trade unions, NGOs, ethical investment institutions and journalists) access to basic accreditation and certification information which include: • Lists of certified Asian toy manufacturers and suppliers put together by the buying / ordering companies, • information given by toy manufacturers and retailers about the proportions of their certified suppliers, • summaries about the results of audits and the performance of supplying factories and companies given by toy manufacturers and retailers on the performance for example to which extent they meet the code’s requirements and • general information about the steps and timeframes of corrective action plans. 13
Page 1 and 2: “Easy to manage” - A report on
Page 3 and 4: Contents Foreword..................
Page 5 and 6: Summary In the past year SwedWatch
Page 7 and 8: about improving the conditions for
Page 9 and 10: Trade Center, does not see the comp
Page 11: • Work towards letting the employ
Page 15 and 16: in December of 2001 7 . Since China
Page 17 and 18: China. After consulting with trade
Page 19 and 20: The working environmental problems
Page 21 and 22: 2. The Swedish toy market The toy m
Page 23 and 24: WTO will lead to more new suppliers
Page 25 and 26: of losing the remaining wages. The
Page 27 and 28: Trade union demands in China China
Page 29 and 30: must not be used 93 . Many of the s
Page 31 and 32: 4. Case study: Top Toy, Brio and Co
Page 33 and 34: The annual turn over of Top Toy is
Page 35 and 36: than many other company codes in th
Page 37 and 38: sleep in each dormitory. Ten bunk b
Page 39 and 40: According to the workers, their wag
Page 41 and 42: plants. According to the law they s
Page 43 and 44: Supplier D The factory is located b
Page 45 and 46: Codes of conduct and social revisio
Page 47 and 48: Complaints The working hours during
Page 49 and 50: Insurances The interviewed workers
Page 51 and 52: Other working conditions Only simpl
Page 53 and 54: SwedWatch was not allowed to visit
Page 55 and 56: Housing The workers get two meals a
Page 57 and 58: 5. Conclusion SwedWatch may with gr
Page 59 and 60: SwedWatch asked Anita Chan, a resea
Page 61 and 62: 1 COOP gave the suppliers A, F, G a
Page 63 and 64:
73 “Case study of the Kader Toy F
Page 65 and 66:
List of references Acona for Insigh
Page 67 and 68:
Maiping, Chen, red, Omvärldsbildni
Page 69 and 70:
Appendix: Comment from Top Toy To S
Page 71:
Appendix: List of Toy campaigns Fai
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4. Case study: Top Toy, Brio and Coop in China - Swedwatch

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