In profile: Indonesia's garment and footwear industry The garment and footwear industries are among the oldest sectors in Indonesia and have historically played an important role in the country's economy.[iii] At 82% in the textile industry and 60-80% in the footwear industry, women make up by far the largest proportion of employees.[iv] They are usually employed in precarious and inhumane working conditions. In the footwear industry in particular, many women work from home without formal employment. Multiple discrimination based on gender, social and ethnic origin, religion, age and disability is part of everyday life. Indonesia in numbers Population (2024): 279,9 million[i] Employees in the garment and shoe industry (2022): approx. 3 million, of which approx. 60-80% are women[ii] An estimated 40,000 home workers in the shoe industry Statutory minimum wage (2023): considerable differences depending on federal state, between EUR 119 (Central Java) and EUR 297 (DKI Jakarta) Cross-sector unionization rate: 7% 8th largest exporter of clothing worldwide, 3rd largest exporter of footwear Living wage estimated by Asia Floor Wage (2022): 8.107.632,00 Indonesian Rupiahs (approx. EUR 465, as of 08/2024) Since the liberalization of the export-oriented economy in the 1980s, the sector has grown rapidly[v] and now accounts for around 5% of all exports.[vi] The country is the world's eighth largest exporter of clothing,[vii] with the footwear industry even taking third place.[viii] The island of Java is the most important production location in Indonesia – around 85% of all textile workers are employed in the provinces of West Java, Central Java, East Java and Banten alone. In West Java in particular, a significant proportion of production for the footwear industry is carried out by homeworkers.[ix] The reason for the market concentration is the comparatively low minimum wages. [x] By 2030, Indonesia aims to be one of the five largest textile producers in the world, at least according to the Indonesian government's "Industry 4.0" master plan. This plan is supported by the increasing relocation of textile production from China to other production countries. [xi] Working conditions in the clothing and footwear industry © project1photo-Depositphotos.com Working conditions in the Indonesian garment and footwear industry vary greatly depending on the province and size of the factory, with small and medium-sized companies performing particularly poorly.[xii] Although the government has ratified international human rights standards and the core labour standards of the International Labor Organization (ILO) and passed labour protection laws, they are not sufficiently implemented. The sector is characterized by precarious employment, a high workload, long working days with mostly unpaid overtime, payment that is often below the minimum wage, unhealthy working conditions, and a lack of social benefits. Workers in some textile factories, for example, report that they must produce between 90 and 120 items per 25 minutes.[xiii] The processing of textiles and leather with chemicals often causes health problems in the skin and respiratory tract. Few production workers keep their jobs for longer than a year, and threats of job loss are omnipresent.[xiv] The International Trade Union Confederation ranks Indonesia 5th (out of 5+) in its Global Rights Index 2022 "Rights not guaranteed". The predominantly female workers are exposed to gender-specific discrimination from the recruitment to the production process.[xv] Intimidation, sexualized harassment, and coercion as well as verbal and physical violence are part of everyday life. For fear of retaliation, such as victim blaming or dismissal, violations of labour rights and sexualized violence are usually not reported, creating a climate of arbitrariness and impunity.[xvi] In the event of pregnancy, female workers are often dismissed, which is why many try to conceal their pregnancy until the very end. If they already have children, many female workers must perform care work alongside their factory work due to the traditional distribution of roles, which leads to a double burden. This is made more difficult by the lack of childcare facilities. If they also organize themselves into a trade union, the result is a triple burden. [xvii] © odua-Depositphotos.com Minimum wages below the living wage The statutory minimum wage in Indonesia was last increased on 1 January 2023 and varies greatly depending on the province. While in the capital Jakarta there is a minimum wage of about 297 EUR (IDR 4,901,798.00), in Central Java, for example, it is less than half that at about EUR 119 (IDR 1,958,169.00).[xviii] A concentration of industry in the provinces with lower minimum wage is therefore hardly surprising. According to the Asia Floor Wage Alliance, even the highest minimum wage in the country is insufficient for a decent living. For 2022, the organization calculated a living wage of EUR 490 (8,107,632 rupiah). Women in Indonesia are paid 23% less than men (gender pay gap).[xix] Anti-union climate At 7%, union membership in Indonesia is relatively low by Asian standards. This is partly due to a high level of informal work and job insecurity.[xx] Companies often actively try to prevent unionization by discriminating against or dismissing union members.[xxi] Although there have been some independent unions since the 1980s, many unions continue to be controlled by factory management and act in the interests of the company.[xxii] Despite the largely female workforce in the textile industry, women are usually underrepresented at trade union leadership level. © FEMNET Home-based work In addition to formal work in factories, the garment and footwear industry in Indonesia today is increasingly characterized by informal home-based work. It is not possible to put an exact figure on the proportion of informal work, as it remains invisible in official statistics. According to the Trade Union Rights Centre (TURC), an Indonesian non-governmental organization supporting women workers and a partner organization of FEMNET, more than 40,000 women and men could be working from home in the Indonesian footwear sector alone.[xxiii] Although the predominantly female homeworkers mainly produce for the Indonesian market, factories also repeatedly resort to homeworking for international orders.[xxiv] Homeworkers usually have no official employment relationship with their employers and are therefore not covered by occupational health and safety legislation.[xxv] Unionization is uncommon, which means that homeworkers are in a weak negotiating position with their employers and are paid far below the minimum wage. Due to the highly flexible employment relationship, lack of information about rights, entitlements, and health risks, as well as a lack of representation of interests, the situation of homeworkers is extremely precarious. Nevertheless, Indonesia has still not ratified ILO Convention 177 on home-based work. Women's rights During the time of the Indonesian colonial independence movement, a lively, politically committed, and influential women's movement developed, to which, among other things, the establishment of gender equality in the constitution is owed. However, this was violently destroyed and banned by the Suharto regime and the so-called "new order" after 1966. In response, the Indonesian state created a state-sponsored social construction of gender roles based on traditional images of women as mothers and housewives. At the same time, women were exploited as cheap labour for the rapidly advancing industrialization.[xxvi] Since the 1980s, independent women's movements have become increasingly active again, but religiously influenced stereotypes and stigmatization are still firmly anchored. For example, an estimated five percent of all Indonesian marriages are polygamous,[xxvii] more than 11 percent of Indonesian girls are affected by child marriage[xxviii] and around half of all girls under the age of 11 are affected by female genital mutilation.[xxix] Wearing the jilbab, a garment that covers the head, neck, and chest, is a requirement in many places and a cause of discrimination. Violence against women is still widespread in Indonesia. According to a survey of 9,000 households, 33% of Indonesian women between the ages of 15 and 64 are subjected to sexualized and physical violence.[xxx] Impact of the pandemic As in the rest of the world, the Covid-19 pandemic has had drastic health, social and economic consequences in Indonesia. These were also felt in the clothing and footwear industry. An ILO study found that existing orders were reduced or halted in 28% of the factories surveyed, while orders were completely cancelled in 18% of cases. Almost a quarter of the factories experienced supply shortages of materials for production.[xxxi] In Indonesia, too, the collapse of international supply chains and their economic consequences were cushioned on the backs of the workers. According to estimates by the Clean Clothes Campaign, garment workers lost around 40% of their average salary between March and May 2020 alone, which amounts to almost €400 million.[xxxii] According to the Indonesian Ministry of Industry, 812,254 garment and footwear workers were temporarily or permanently laid off by July 2020, representing around 30% of the total workforce.[xxxiii] Over the course of the entire pandemic, the number of layoffs is said to have risen to 2.1 million.[xxxiv] Although there were government programs in place in the event of layoffs, which included financial support and further training, these were difficult to access and insufficient in scope for garment and footwear workers.[xxxv] Due to flexible working conditions and a lack of savings, layoffs and wage cuts or cuts during the pandemic led to considerable economic problems for most female workers in the clothing and footwear industry. To counter these, those affected often resorted to measures such as taking out loans or cutting back on household expenses, which often led to malnutrition.[xxxvi] Companies also used the pandemic as an opportunity to undermine the work of trade unions and deregulate labour standards. Reports of labour rights violations and requests to management were rejected or ignored across the board due to the pandemic.[xxxvii]There was also an increase in discrimination, threats, violence, false accusations, and arrests.[xxxviii] According to a survey by the Business and Human Rights Resource Centre, there has been a noticeable deterioration in freedom of association and collective bargaining rights in the textile industry as a result of the pandemic. The crisis during the pandemic has led to a new normal. Without strong worker representation and collective action, garment workers face falling wages, more precarious working conditions, longer hours and unpunished violence and harassment. According to the Indonesian Footwear Industry Association, the footwear sector was less affected by the pandemic than the textile sector and even experienced a 61% increase in production. A survey conducted by TURC at various factories also showed that there were no wage cuts. However, the negative effects of the pandemic were passed on to homeworkers. As the lockdown and factory closures temporarily halted production for the Indonesian market, homeworkers received no orders from one day to the next - and as they are not considered employees, they were unable to assert any claims under labor law.[xxxix] Sources [i] World population review Indonesia [ii] Asean Briefing - Indonesia’s Textile and Garment Industry: Opportunities for Foreign [iii] Hal Hill. 1992. Indonesia’s Textile and Garment Industries: Development in an Asian Perspective. Institute of Southeast Asian [iv] ILO - Indonesia’s garment industry to combat gender inequality and empower women workers und https://labourbehindthelabel.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/2017-08-No-excuses-for-homework.-Working-conditions-in-the-Indonesian-leather-and-footwear-sector.pdf [v] Better Work. 2019. An Impact Evaluation of Better Work from a Gender Perspective [vi] Fairwear - Indonesia [vii] Wert für 2021, siehe Statista – Textile Apparel Goods Leading Exporters Worldwide [viii] Asia Perspective – Indonesia Textile Clothing Manufacturing [ix] Laut Sukapto et al sind mehr als 50% der indonesischen Heimarbeit in Cibaduyut, Bandung, angesiedelt sein, siehe “Improving Occupational Safety and Health in Footwear Home Industry through Implementation of ILO-PATRIS, NOSACQ-50 and Participatory Ergonomics: A Case Study”, International Journal of Technology 10(5):908, 201 [x] Fairwear - Indonesia [xi] Asia Perspective – Indonesia Textile Clothing Manufacturing [xii] Fairwear - Indonesia [xiii] Shikha Silliman Bhattacharjee, Fast fashion, production targets, and gender-based violence in Asian garment supply chains, in Labor, Global Supply Chains, and the Garment Industry in South Asia, Jan 2020, Publisher: Routledge [xiv] Shikha Silliman Bhattacharjee, Fast fashion, production targets, and gender-based violence in Asian garment supply chains, in Labor, Global Supply Chains, and the Garment Industry in South Asia, Jan 2020, Publisher: Routledge [xv] https://www.ilo.org/jakarta/info/public/pr/WCMS_838968/lang--en/index.htm [xvi] Shikha Silliman Bhattacharjee, Fast fashion, production targets, and gender-based violence in Asian garment supply chains, in Labor, Global Supply Chains, and the Garment Industry in South Asia, Jan 2020, Publisher: Routledge [xvii] New Mandala – The Triple Work Burden of Indonesia’s Women Unionists [xviii] Umgerechnet von IDR in EUR am 03.01.2023, siehe Wage Indicator [xix] UN Women Asia Pacific – Gender Pay Gap Statistic in Indonesia September 2020 [xx] ILO Asia Research Brief 2020 - The supply chain ripple effect: How COVID-19 is affecting garment workers and factories in Asia and the Pacific [xxi] IndustriAll – Union Busting at Tainan Enterprises Indonesia und https://labourbehindthelabel.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/2017-08-No-excuses-for-homework.-Working-conditions-in-the-Indonesian-leather-and-footwear-sector.pdf [xxii] New Mandala – The Triple Work Burden of Indonesia’s Women Unionists [xxiii] https://labourbehindthelabel.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/2017-08-No-excuses-for-homework.-Working-conditions-in-the-Indonesian-leather-and-footwear-sector.pdf [xxiv] https://api.fairwear.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/FWF-indonesia-homeworker-report.pdf [xxv] https://labourbehindthelabel.net/wp-content/uploads/2017/03/2017-08-No-excuses-for-homework.-Working-conditions-in-the-Indonesian-leather-and-footwear-sector.pdf [xxvi] Südostasien – Indonesien Feminismus als Klassenfrage [xxvii] ABC - Inside Indonesia's controversial training seminars preparing Muslims for polygamous marriage. [xxviii] Stand 2018, siehe UNICEF Child Marriage Factsheet [xxix] Terre des Femmes – Weibliche Genitalverstümmelung Indonesien [xxx] United Nations Population Fund [xxxi] ILO Asia Research Brief 2020 - The supply chain ripple effect: How COVID-19 is affecting garment workers and factories in Asia and the Pacific [xxxii] Kampagne für Saubere Kleidung - Bericht 2020: Un(der)paid in the Pandemic. [xxxiii] ILO Asia Research Brief 2020 - The supply chain ripple effect: How COVID-19 is affecting garment workers and factories in Asia and the Pacific [xxxiv] ILO Asia Research Brief 2020 - The supply chain ripple effect: How COVID-19 is affecting garment workers and factories in Asia and the Pacific [xxxv] Business and Human Rights Resource Centre: Covid 19 Action Tracker Indonesia [xxxvi] Luh Kitty Katherina, Angga Sisca Rahadian, Andhika Ajie Baskoro, Puguh Prasetyoputra, Puguh Prasetyoputra, Strategi adaptasi keluarga pekerja industri garmen di Kabupaten Bogor pada situasi pandemi COVID-19, December 2021 Jurnal Kependudukan Indonesia 16(2):111-126. [xxxvii] New Mandala – The Triple Work Burden of Indonesia’s Women Unionists [xxxviii] Business and Human Rights Resource Centre Bericht: Unpicked [xxxix] TURC (2022): Covid 19: Worker-Driven Monitoring and Evidence-Based Social Dialogue in Indonesian Garment Factories, https://turc.or.id/en/publications/books/covid-19-worker-driven-monitoring-and-evidence-based-social-dialogue-in-indonesian-garment-factories/ back
