Samsung was all over the news headlines last month when one of its Chinese suppliers was accused of possible child labor violations by the China Labor Watch which conducted the investigation. The supplier we’re talking about is Dongguan Shinyang Electronics Co. Ltd. Samsung temporarily suspended business with them and launched an investigation in order to determine if the accusations were true considering that would violate Samsung’s “zero tolerance policy on child labor.”
Reuters reports that Samsung resumed its contract with Shinyang Electronics after stating that there’s been evidence of child labor but that those under-aged workers have been employed by a third-party subcontractor through a labor dispatch agency. Today Samsung went public and stated the following: “Samsung has decided to still take measures against Dongguan Shinyang to hold the supplier responsible for failing to monitor its subcontractors, in accordance with Samsung’s zero tolerance policy on child labour.” Samsung cut its order to this Chinese part supplier by 30% as punishment or disapproval if you wish, though they will continue their business with them considering they didn’t employ those kids directly. A Shinyang Engineering official stated the following: “We will ensure that similar incidents do not recur.” as well as stating that there are no child workers in Dongguan Shinyang now.
This decision might be perceived as a disappointing one though. Using child labor in China is pretty common so this might not be a suitable punishment for the Chinese supplier who apparently didn’t pay enough attention at who’s working on their production lines. We’ll see if there will be any further development in this particular case, there might be considering we live in a world where child labor is more common each day. Do you think this is enough of a punishment for Dongguan Shinyang or would you take some extra precautions?