Death of Saipan’s garment industry shatters Pinoys’ dreams

SUSUPE, Saipan – Rose Clemente, 43, used to sew clothing for global brands such as Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Jones New York, Gap, Old Navy, JC Penney and American Eagle for 14 years in the US island of Saipan. With her income as a garment worker, she was able to feed her family, send her children to school, and remit to relatives in the Philippines. Clemente, who hails from Navotas, lost her dear job when the fourth garment factory she worked for since arriving on Saipan in 1990 shut down operation in 2004. She has since been unable to find a stable job. "Nakaka-miss ang factory, pati yung tunog ng mga makina. Nami-miss ko rin yung bonding ng mga kasama ko sa trabaho lalo na kapag break time…Ngayon wala pa rin akong steady na trabaho," she told GMANews.TV. [I miss the factory, even the sound of the machines. I also miss the bonding with my colleagues especially during break time. I still don’t have a steady job.] Saipan’s garment factories producing 'Made in the USA' clothing started closing one after the other since January 2005, when the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade (GATT) expired, eliminating quotas on textile exports to the United States. The GATT had regulated all global trade in textiles and apparel since 1974. From having 34 garment factories in the late 1990s, Saipan no longer has a garment industry to speak of. Saipan is the capital of the US Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI), which is home to some 10,000 overseas Filipino workers and Filipino-Americans. The island’s garment industry alone used to employ 15,000 foreign workers, mostly Chinese and Filipinos. The last factory shut down operations in February, garment which sealed the fate of the once almighty and controversial Saipan garment industry. What’s left are dilapidated and empty buildings that once housed factories and employee housing easily referred here as "barracks." Saipan used to be an attractive place for garment manufacturers because of its exemption from quotas and tariffs on goods shipped to the U.S. But when the trade quota was lifted in January 2005, factories on Saipan started moving to China, Vietnam, Bangladesh, Pakistan and Cambodia where the minimum wage is way below the CNMI's $4.05 an hour rate. As a result, 15,000 jobs were lost, many of them Filipinos like Clemente. Most of the former garment workers have gone back to their country -- China, Philippines, Bangladesh, Korea, Thailand and Nepal, among other Asian countries. Hundreds of former garment workers are still on Saipan working on different job categories. Many of them are OFWs. Clemente’s worst fear is being forced to be away from her three children if she gets deported for lack of job. She said her husband is also an OFW on Saipan. Along with thousand others, the Clemente couple is not certain what will happen to them once the US federal government takes over local immigration by Nov. 28. The federalization law set the takeover by June 1 but this was pushed back by 180 days, the maximum allowed by law. "Gusto kong makapag-stay dito para maalagaan ko ang mga anak ko. Lahat sila nasa public school [I want to be able to stay here so I could take care of my children. They are all studying in public schools]," said Clemente in an interview during a weekend get-together of former OFW garment employees of Sako Corp. Many of them have families here. Most of these children were born here and therefore have United States citizenship, something that the OFW parents are holding on to. Clemente added that she has yet to collect some $16,000 in back wages from one of three former garment employers. She and former colleagues filed a lawsuit against a former employer over discrimination. The court decided in their favor, but they have yet to collect the judgment granted them. Bonifacio Tuazon, 44, rose from the ranks from a garment cutter to a line leader in a span of 15 years. Since he arrived on Saipan in 1990, he worked only for Sako Corp., which produced “Made in the USA" clothing for Gap, Lee, Abercrombie & Fitch and Jones New York, among other international brands. Sako Corp. abandoned its workers, by closing its factories without a notice to workers and without paying them their lat few salaries. Sako Corp. was one of the first factories to close, but the succeeding factories to close were able to help their workers and pay all their wages. Tuazon, from San Mateo, Rizal, now works as a painter, earning a minimum wage of $4.05 an hour which he said makes it difficult to feed his four children, aged 2 to 16. His wife also used to work for the same garment factory. "Ang pinakana-miss ko ay iyong malaking sweldo sa garment na pinagtrabahuan ko [The one thing I miss the most is the hefty salary in the garment factory I worked for]," he said. Richard Pierce, the CNMI governor's special assistant for trade relations and economic affairs, said 10 years ago, the CNMI collected nearly $40 million in annual user's fee, and another $40 million in related economic contributions. He said these are now just part of CNMI history. During its peak years, Saipan’s garment industry used to rake in over $1 billion in annual sales of brand clothing such as Levi’s, Ann Taylor, Anne Klein, Polo Ralph Lauren and Liz Claiborne. Besides the death of its garment industry, the CNMI's crumbling economy is exacerbated by uncertainties associated with the start of the transition to federal immigration by Nov. 28, and another 50-cent increase in minimum wage by May. The wage hike comes at a time when employers are already having difficulty paying their workers and staying in business. From the ultimate globalization success story, Saipan now faces one of the fastest economic collapses in the history of America and the world because of the demise of the garment industry. "What's happening on Saipan is an extreme compressed version of what's happening elsewhere in the US and the world; like a lab test of what globalization does for good and ill," American journalist Adam Yamaguchi said in a documentary on Current TV, a cable network founded by former US Vice President Al Gore. The documentary features the birth and death of Saipan's garment industry which fueled the CNMI's economic boom, along with tourism, which is expected to get worse due to the global economic crunch and US restrictions on emerging markets such as China and Russia come Nov. 28. Many OFWs on Saipan who were former garment employees and now without permanent job are bracing for the worse. "Hindi natin alam kung ano talaga ang mangyayari. Malaking kawalan talaga ang pagsara ng mga garment factories sa mga OFW na katulad naming [We don’t know what will really happen. The closure of garment factories is really a big loss to OFWs like us]," Clemente added. - GMANews.TV