From March 25 to 27 trade unions, women's groups and labour
rights organisations from Bangladesh, Cambodia, Hong Kong,
India, Indonesia, Korea, Pakistan, the Philippines, Sri
Lanka, Taiwan and Thailand met in Phnom Penh to plan the
Asian contribution to Play Fair At The Olympics. Speakers
at the meeting strongly emphasised that the campaign must
focus on concrete ways that workers themselves can get more
power to improve their lives. They particularly want sportswear
brands to ensure that workers are allowed to form unions
and bargain together for better wages and conditions.
The meeting was organised jointly by the Asia Monitor Resource
Centre, the Thai Labour Campaign and the Clean Clothes Campaign
and was hosted by Womyn's Agenda for Change.
On March 26, 2004, the second night of the meeting in Pnomh
Penh, there was a trip out to local factory areas to meet
with Cambodian women who work in garment and sportswear
factories. By candle-light in tiny concrete rooms (each
of which) housed up to three women) they discussed their
lives and their work. All the people at the meeting were
struck by the similarities in the issues facing these women
and those facing women workers in their home countries in
other parts of Asia.