Pandemia suffocates world supply chains and their workers at both ends

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In his last weeks of work on the shift of goods of the department storesJ.C.Penney from her city, Alexandra Orozco took her mobile phone and pressed the record key.The 22 year old record.Another video, which went up to the platform on October 13, shows the gigantic posters in black and red with the "Total Liquidation" label that hung from the roof to the ground and a disturbing image of a section of the half -empty basement.

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“Quedándome sin trabajo poco a poco”, puso como pie de foto unos días antes de que el establecimiento de Delano,California, cerrara definitivamente.The store is one of the 156 j.C.Penney from all over the United States that lowered the blind betweenJune and December 2020.

Orozco started working there part -time when he was 18 years old and in almost four years he rose from cash to the merchandise team, where he downloaded trucks full of new stocks and made inventory.Cuatro días a la semana llegaba a la tienda a eso de las cuatro o las cinco de la mañana.That early schedule suited him.Although Orozco liked his job, the crowds made her nervous.Now, since they fired her, she suffers stress.He has submitted requests for a couple of jobs - one to take care.

"It's a shame," he explains on his home with the soft sound of a background TV."I never thought it would happen.Delano is a small city.There are not many stores.Here it is difficult to find employment ".

On the other side of the world, Matefo Litali was also affected by cataclysm.This 53 -year experienced seamstress worked during the last 14 in workshops to make all Lesoto, a small mountain country surrounded by South African territory. TziccClothing, que confecciona ropa para los gigantes estadounidensesJ.C.Penney and Walmart, used it for two months before, in March 2020, national confinement measures bound all factories to temporarily close.On May 6, Litali returned to work, but the next day, at the end of his turn, the address told him not to come back.Tzicc confirmed that the last day of the worker was May 7.

"I felt helpless," he recalls."The first thing that happened to me was, why me?".

These two women have never coincided, nor is they likely to coincide.A lives in a remote agricultural city on the west coast of the United States;The other, about 16.000 kilometers from there, in southern Africa, in one of the smallest countries in the world.This last year, the lives of both - and their subsistence means - were connected by a pandemic that has broken one of the world's supply chains and, with it, also their economies.The confinements for the COVID-19 have devastated an retail sector that already struggled to survive before the arrival of the coronavirus, which has contributed to the collapse of the world clothing market and has caused serious damage to millions of workers, the vast majority womenlike Orozco and Litali.

In Lesoto, which has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, the effects of the pandemic were noticed immediately.Throughout the last two decades, its textile industry experienced enormous growth, until becoming the main employer of the country with a contribution of more than 20% to the national GDP. Gran parte de su éxito se debe al acuerdo comercial denominado Ley deCrecimiento y Oportunidades para África (AGOA, por sus siglas en inglés), firmado en 2000 por el entonces presidente BillClinton, que permite las exportaciones libres de impuestos a Estados Unidos.Today, Lesoto's clothing workers, 90% women, make clothes for some of the most emblematic American brands such as Levi Strauss, Wrangler, Macy’s and Walmart.

La pandemia asfixia las cadenas de suministro mundiales y a sus trabajadoras en ambos extremos

Aunque la industria textil de Lesoto es menos conocida que la de las potencias deChina o Bangladés, constituye otro ejemplo de una economía fuertemente dependiente de la demanda de Estados Unidos. Según los últimos datos disponibles de la Organización Mundial delComercio, correspondientes a 2017, fuera del continente africano, Estados Unidos es el principal receptor de exportaciones de Lesoto, con alrededor de un 50%.And while the country has been relatively unscathed from Coronavirus with less than 11.000 cases registered from the beginning until April 2021, the consequences of the severe US closing measures have penetrated in the leothense industry with an equally devastating effect.

Meanwhile, in the United States the retailers of the preparation have been specially affected.Although j.C.Penney had ceased to be profitable in 2010, last May the department store declared bankruptcy after 118 years of history.Six months later it was acquired by another company, but a source that knew closely the situation confirmed that during the restructuring had already reduced its staff by about 10.000 workers, which meant about 11% of its workforce in the United States.This year, the bankruptcies of great retailers in the country have shot.J.Crew, Neiman Marcus y Brooks Brothers son tres ejemplos de las 46 registradas en 2020 según datos comerciales de S&P Global.

"And when a great American retailer sinks," explains Neil Saunders, managing director of the Globaldata Retail Studies, "the effects are noticed throughout the planet".

The United States is one of the world's leading clothing importers: it represents around a quarter of the world's total retail business spending.At the beginning of the pandemic, when the American retailers canceled or left without paying orders already made worth bills of dollars, the effects spread rapidly by the supply chain worldwide.Thousands of international clothing factories closed, with the consequent layoffs and generalized suspensions of employees, such as Litali in Lesoto.The International Labor Organization (ILO) reports that, betweenJanuary andJune 2020, in the US the importation of clothing fell 26%, which represents a loss of 17.000 million for factories throughout the planet compared to the same period of the previous year.

“AunqueJ.C.Penney was not profitable, it was still an important business, ”says Saunders."It still makes many orders to suppliers and maintains a large number of jobs worldwide, so the consequences are of great reach".

En TziccClothing, donde trabajaba Litali, más o menos una quinta parte de los empleados han perdido su trabajo desde mayo, informa Tsepang Makakole, del Sindicato Nacional de Trabajadores de laConfección, el Textil y Actividades Afines (NACTWU, por sus siglas en inglés) de Lesoto.Makakole knows at least six factories who have closed in the country leaving thousands without employment.

"For women it is a disaster," he adds."The majority of those who work in factories are mothers of single -parent family and, right now, the sector faces a total collapse".

The seamstress Litali tells that his legs faltered when he was given the news that he suddenly stood out.In the 1990s, a multitude of Taiwanese and Chinese clothing factories moved to Lesoto.Litali says that she was one of the first women who taught to sew.In Tzicc he sat at his table five days a week and made gymnastics t -shirts and meshes with an old and spent sewing machine.The factory was one floor, with brick walls seen, and more than 1 were crowded inside.000 women.

Litali has been a widow for eight years and is in charge of her youngest daughter, 20, and her grandson of four.During the confinement, his boss took three months to pay him the $ 94 of his last salary, until May. TziccClothing también alegó que Litali no tenía derecho al subsidio mensual de 160 dólares del Gobierno porque su contrato era en periodo de prueba.Malekena NTSIKI, organizer of the Independent Democratic Union of Lesoto (Idul), demanded both issues to Tzicc on behalf of Litali, and declares that the government's subsidy is intended for all workers, regardless of their contract class. La directora de recursos humanos de TziccClothing, Masefatsa Mofolo, confirmó que la empresa había despedido a trabajadores debido a que tenía menos pedidos, y que Litali había perdido su empleo.According to the manager, all employees with a contract -to -period contract were fired during the pandemic.

While waiting for his last check, Litali did not receive income or support for three months.His family survived thanks to the food packages that the local church gave him until the salary arrived."I was so nervous that I thought I was going crazy," he recalls.“I spent the day at home sleeping, without doing anything.I didn't want to talk to anyone or ask for help ”.

At a certain moment, he thought about the possibility of marrying his partner, an electrician who charged the day.“I thought so, that I was older, but that it was having a bad time and that there was a person.Maybe marriage could be of some help, ”says half a joke.The couple was together a couple of months, but now it has separated. EnCalifornia, Orozco pasa de vez en cuando por delante de la tiendaJ.C.Penney from the city on the way to the bank.In the windows there are no commercial posters and the doors are closed."It's very sad," he laments.“I was doing very well with the cleaning lady who worked here.I was remedy for insomnia.I was very sad to know that I would probably not see her again ".

Un portavoz deJ.C.Penney declined to comment on the effect of the closure of its stores throughout the country.Although Orozco lives with his parents, he still has to pay the car bills and the phone.Cuando la tienda deJ.C.Penney temporarily closed in March in compliance with anticovid measures, left three months and requested unemployment benefit.

He took the time to improve his second source of income: a makeup products business. Puso en marcha Glossy BabyCosmetics.Sells false eyelashes, lip and clothing shine through Instagram.The young woman spends hours looking for products online and then buying wholesale when she finds something she likes."Now my room looks like a tornado," he says referring to boxes.

It's still soon and people don't spend as much as before. En diciembre de 2020, Orozco ingresaba entre 200 y 300 dólares mensuales en ventas de su nuevo negocio por internet, alrededor de cinco veces menos que su sueldo enJ.C.Penney.

Dismissal has also affected your mental health.Orozco suffers from depression attacks and often wants to abandon his recent business activity, but his family quickly convinces her that he does not do it.His mother, Luz, who is 42 years old, emigrated from Mexico to the United States at 13 and set up his own party organization business, is especially persuasive.Even if Orozco's options are limited.Delano is just over two hours by Los Angeles car, he has about 50.000 inhabitants and work is scarce, says the young woman.J.C.Penney era una de las pocas cadenas de tiendas que quedaban en la ciudad, y muchas compañeras de Orozco tampoco han encontrado otro trabajo desde que los almacenes cerraron.

"I didn't have many employees, but the store was important for Delano," he explains."People are very sad.It was the only place where they sold beautiful clothes, like Levi’s.And it had been a long time since there was.My mother used to go there with her mother ".Although it is not impossible for him to recover, the fall in the demand for clothing does not show signs of stopping, observes Saunders, from Globaldata. Según el avance de datos sobre ventas mensuales publicado por la Oficina delCenso de Estados Unidos, en octubre de 2020 las ventas descendieron un 4,2% con respecto al mes anterior.

"If this continues, in 2021 and the following years, it could have serious [lasting] consequences for clothing supply chains," adds the Executive.“In a context of low demand, prices become an important problem.The actors compete with each other and the workers often suffer the consequences through working conditions, rights, wages and schedules ”.

The life of Litali and Orozco became uncertain.In Lesoto, Litali spent several months waiting patiently at the gates of several clothing factories in search of work.In August he got a job sewing jeans in Pressitex, a factory close to that of the company where he worked before, but his contract is temporary and, as the months go by, he fears that they do not renew it.

When he learned that the rent of a kiosk in the shopping center of his city cost 5.000 dollars every two months, Orozco began to look for more profitable ways to impulse his business on Instagram.Expect to save enough to open a physical store."Right now I don't know whether to take a risk and invest a little more in the business or pay the invoices," he doubt.“It's a lot of stress, but it's worth it, do you know?I know that one day it will be worth it ".

This article was originally published in English in the framework of the Association between The Associated Press and The Fuller Project.Additional research: Makhaba Nkune.

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