Rare photos and a video of life outside Foxconn’s factory complex in Shenzhen, China
French journalist Jordan Pouille, who reported last May on the working conditions at Foxconn’s giant Shenzhen factory complex, paid a second visit recently.
He came back from China with photos, a videotape and a clearer picture than we’ve seen before of what life is like for the people who build iPhones and iPads for Apple (AAPL), PSPs for Sony (SNE), printer cartridges for Hewlett-Packard (HPQ).
According to Pouille, all the workers he met were teenagers or twentysomethings, mostly from poverty-stricken Chinese provinces like Henan, Hunan and Sichuan. The biggest changes he observed since last Spring, he says, stem from the pay raises the workers received after a wave of suicides earlier this year.
“Once a week,” he writes, “owing to their bigger salary, workers are able to treat themselves and enjoy simple pleasures like a funny haircut or a good candy. They like showing [off], and the bridge over Foxconn main gate now looks like a catwalk.”
But Pouille was not persuaded. He titled the piece he posted Friday “Why I don’t want an iPhone for Christmas.”
Video teaser (in French) below the fold. Note the anti-theft anti-suicide window gates on the high-rise dormitories. Also the claim by one worker that she can assemble 3,000 iPhones per day.
UPDATE: The video has been moved behind some kind of wall. Apologies to those who got here too late.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BYMvSiHZNvU&feature=player_embedded
[Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter @philiped]
