website of the IUF in Asia/Pacific – uniting food, farm and hotel workers
Following two months of negotiations and trade union activities, the IUF-affiliated Kirin Miwon Foods Workers’ Union (SPKMF) has reached an agreement with PT Kirin Miwon Foods which secures real wage bargaining rights. This is an historic victory for it is the first time a trade union has successfully bargained wages with PT Kirin Miwon (a joint venture between the transnational company Kirin from Japan and Daesang of Korea in Lampung, southern Sumatra).
In March 2010, the IUF-affiliated Kirin Miwon Foods Workers Union (SPKMF) in Indonesia began wage negotiations with management. The union has proposed a collective agreement for 2010 which includes wage increases in line with the increase of living expenses. In countries throughout the world, this is a standard practice between unions and companies. It is a right protected under international law and the laws of Indonesia. Wage negotiations are also practiced in many countries where Kirin, the Japanese food conglomorate, operates; Australia and Japan, for example. However, in Indonesia, the company has refused to negotiate with SPKMF. Management is insisting on persisting with practices inherited from the Suharto dictatorship, when wages were imposed by diktat and the “official” unions were controlled by the management.
Stop Nespressure! Send a protest message to Nestlé.
On 18 September 2009, IUF-affiliated and fraternal unions representing food workers met in Wellington, as part of on-going activities of the Food and Beverage Unions Group (FBUG) in New Zealand. The FBUG was created through the New Zealand Council of Trade Unions (NZCTU) to allow food unions to coordinate and discuss activities in the sector. The meeting was hosted by the NZCTU’s President Helen Kelly and General Secretary Peter Conway. IUF Asia/Pacific regional secretary Ma Wei Pin attended the meeting and related the continuing struggle of Nescafe workers in Indonesia for collective bargaining rights on wages. The representatives of the National Distributive Union (NDU), the Service and Food Workers Union (SFWU), the Dairy Workers Union (DWU), the National Meat Workers Union (NMWU) and the Engineering, Printing and Manufacturing Union (EPMU) all pledged support and will encourage their members to join the campaign.
Support Nescafe workers’ right to negotiate wages: send Nestlé a protest message.
The following joint press release from IUF affiliates the FIEU of Malaysia and the SBNIP of Indonesia was released on 22 June 2009 on the occasion of a solidarity visit by FIEU representatives, including union members from Nestlé Malaysia, to Lampung, Indonesia. SBNIP is engaged in a struggle to claim trade union rights to negotiate wages. In Malaysia, Nestlé negotiates wages with the FIEU, in Indonesia, Nestlé refuses to negotiate wages with the SBNIP.
Ten representatives from Malaysia Food Industry Employees Union (FIEU) came to Lampung to provide solidarity support to Indonesia Nestlé Panjang Workers Union (SBNIP).
FIEU represents 7,000 workers in the food industry, including 2,200 Nestlé workers in six factories and one warehouse in Malaysia.
The IUF-affiliated Nestlé Indonesia Panjang Trade Union (SBNIP), which represents workers at the only factory in Indonesia making Nescafe, Nestlé’s most prominent product worldwide, concluded a successful two-day series of activities on 30 April and 1 May highlighting Nestlé’s continuing refusal to respect Indonesian and international law and conduct good faith bargaining and negotiate wages with the union to reach a collective agreement.
On 30 April, in conjunction with the Faculty of Law at the University of Lampung and The Lampung Post, a discussion was held on the topic of “protection of freedom of association and wage negotiation for workers”. Speakers at the forum were F.X. Sumarja, Faulty of Law, University of Lampung, Domiril Hakim, head of the Ministry of Manpower Office, Lampung City and Eko Sumaryono, SBNIP President.
Finding a huge signboard publicly proclaiming that management at a five-star hotel love their union is almost as rare as finding a hen’s tooth.
Yet the now-notorious Grand Aquila Hotel, located at the entrance to Bandung on the highway from Jakarta, has done just this, as a result of the management coming under police investigation for brutally busting the union formed by workers late in 2008. The workers were no longer prepared to put up with slave-like conditions and have their income cut at management’s whim.
When the management proclaims “love” of the union, they do not mean the real union whose banner hangs across a hotel entrance and whose leader is talking to the union demonstrators and passers-by.
IUF Global Newswire LabourStart
