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Document 60 of 67.

Copyright 1998 Information Access Company,
a Thomson Corporation Company;
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Copyright 1998 Fairchild Publications Inc.
Footwear News

May 18, 1998

SECTION: No. 20, Vol. 54; Pg. 4; ISSN: 0162-914X

IAC-ACC-NO: 20646424

LENGTH: 446 words

HEADLINE: NIKE UNFURLS ANTSWEATSHOP MEASURES.

BYLINE: Ramey, Joanna

BODY:
WASHINGTON -- After spending two years in a cloud of bad publicity, Nike Chairman and CEO Phil Knight last week tried to set the record straight.

In a speech before the National Press Club, in which he unveiled six new anti-sweatshop initiatives, Knight may not have exactly appeased his critics who've dogged Nike over working conditions at its contractors in Asia. But he got a lot off his chest.

"It has been said that Nike has single-handedly lowered the human rights standards for the sole purpose of maximizing profits; that Nike products have become synonymous with slave wages, forced overtime and arbitrary abuse. One columnist said Nike represents not only everything that's wrong with sports but everything that is wrong with the world," Knight said. "So I figured that I'd just come out and let you journalists have a look at the great Satan up close and personal."

The six anti-sweatshop initiatives were: to expand current independent monitoring programs and make summaries of inspections public; to increase the minimum age of footwear factory workers to 18; to adopt U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration indoor air quality standards at all footwear factories; to expand educational programs at factories, providing middle and high school equivalency courses; to increase support of Nike's existing micro-enterprise loan program for women to create small businesses in Vietnam, Indonesia, Pakistan and Thailand, and to fund research to explore issues related to global manufacturing and responsible business practices.

Knight said the bad publicity from being the target of human rights groups hasn't hurt Nike's bottom line in lost business.

"I truthfully don't think that there has been a material impact on Nike sales by the human rights attacks. I think that everybody has heard somebody say, 'Well, I'm not going to buy Nike shoes because of what's going on in their factories,' but the fact of the matter is our studies indicate there is not a significant decrease in sales because of that."

Labor advocates generally reacted positively to the initiatives announced; they said it was important to wait and see how well they were implemented. And they pointed out the notable absence of any plans for Nike to increase the wages paid to its factory workers.

"Whether it's independent monitoring depends on who's doing the monitoring. Didn't Phil Knight think paying Andrew Young was independent monitoring?" asked Elaine Bernard, executive director, Harvard University Trade Union School. Young, a former U.N. ambassador, two years ago audited Nike factories in Asia at the company's request and made recommendations.

LANGUAGE: ENGLISH

IAC-CREATE-DATE: May 29, 1998

LOAD-DATE: May 30, 1998