Entries in Phil O. Sophie - what we believe in (6)

Friday
Jul022010

Blood Sweat & T Shirts...

Fascinated by an episode of Blood Sweat & T Shirts, a 2008 doco about 6 British fashionistas who go to work in India's textile industry.  They work lots of places, from a high-end designer clothing factory to backstreet slums.

I'll give your wife my mascara if you sew the sleeves for me!Depressingly, at a good factory, they make enough to buy a can of deodorant at the end of the day.

Richard would rather work an all-nighter than sleep at the factoryElsewhere, they stay up all night making 36 blouses (in preference to sleeping on the floor under their machines as other workers were!)The factory's overnight accomodation - tucked up under your sewing machine! 

Unfortunately only 15 of their blouses pass the factory's quality control, and they make 30 rupees each (about 75 cents AUD)  for their efforts.

Is this factory even legal?Worse still are the rabbit warren of backstreet slum factories. Conditions are so dismal,the British workers are amazed that they're not illegal. 

Carrying a load of brand name jeans through the Mumbai slumsWhat is illegal is child workers under 14  (but they still meet a 16 year old who has worked since age 10!)

What can I say?

Monday
Jan252010

Why you can buy a dress for $10...

Bought this dress last year for $10. In fact, everything in the store was on sale for $10.  With clothes so cheap, why would anyone bother to sew their own? 

I found a good reason while I was reading a beautiful book called Hungry Planet by Peter Menzel and Faith D'Aluisio.  It's full of great photos of 30 families in 24 countries, detailing "what the world eats."

Here's a local family living just outside Brisbane and their stash of goodies for a week...The Browns from Riverview spent $376 USD on this weekly spread...

And a rural Chinese family with their weeks worth of shopping...The Cui's from a village outside Beijing spent $57 USD on this healthier looking selection...

Li Jinxian (in the yellow polo shirt) works in a factory making clothing for the US.  She's paid $2.50 USD for a ten-hour workday.  Unsurprisingly, she dislikes the job - she'd have to sew 70 hours a week for 3 weeks just to pay for the weekly shopping shown.  Her husband is forced to work in Beijing, coming home only on the weekends, as there is no work in the village where he can earn enough to support the family.  They never eat food outside their home.  "It's very expensive", says Li Jinxian.  " We aren't in that kind of circumstance."

Hmmm, even in my darkest hour financially, I still manage to eat out at least once a week.

So I guess this Chinese family is why I can buy a dress for $10.  Whoever made that dress probably got paid about 25 cents. 

Somehow, finding this out has made cheap clothing seem even cheaper and a bit nastier.  How much more valuable is hand-made clothing made willingly by someone who loves you!

Friday
Dec182009

She has a dream...

Updated on Dec 26, 2009 at 10:53 by Registered Commenter[Carmen]

graphics from Joyce Meyer ministriesHope you have a lovely Christmas and all your hopes and plans for 2010 come true!

Do something good for those living in poverty this  holiday season.  If your friends and family have got it all, give to someone else who needs it!

This morning I visited micro-finance lenders www.kiva.org and bought one of their handy gift certificates.

The recipient gets to choose a low-income entrepreneur in a developing country to lend the gift money to .  When the loan is repaid they can get the money back or re-lend it.  Sweet!

Click to read more ...

Friday
Jun192009

(Organic) cotton-pickin' story

from Sunday Mail 7.6.09

Summer Rayne Oakes, author of eco-shopping guide Style Naturally was in Brisbane recently for Greenfest. (Missed it, I was out of town, but if anyone went, let me know!) The Cornell Uni graduate modelled these looks from eco-friendly companies for our local newspaper.

 

Nice to see it's no longer hippy, brown-sack type clothing, in case you were worried!

Lots of the pictured clothing ranges use organic cotton, and here's one of the reasons why.

This story's from Matilda Lee's book Eco-Chic...

Click to read more ...

Tuesday
May192009

Carpe diem

Just a little story today...

Ann Wells from the Los Angeles Times writes:

My brother-in-law opened the bottom drawer of my sister's bureau and lifted out a tissue-wrapped package... He discarded the tissue and handed me the slip. It was exquisite, silk, hand-made - the price tag with an astronomical figure on it was still attached.

Click to read more ...