http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13357555/

Apple Computer Inc. is having an iPod-related public relations headache this week, following a report by a British newspaper on working conditions at Chinese factories where the popular music player is built.

The Mail on Sunday reported that a Chinese factory that manufactures iPods employs 200,000 workers who live in dormitories where visitors are not permitted. Workers toil for 15-hour days for as little as $50 per month, according to the article.

As Mac fan sites buzzed with debate over the report, Apple issued a statement saying it is investigating the matter.

"Apple is committed to ensuring that working conditions in our supply chain are safe, workers are treated with respect and dignity, and manufacturing processes are environmentally responsible," the company statement said.

Apple said it is "investigating the allegations regarding working conditions in the iPod manufacturing plant in China." It added, "We do not tolerate any violations of our supplier code of conduct."

IPod factory workers are employed by Taiwanese contract manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., also known by the brand Foxconn Electronics Inc. The relationship between Apple and Hon Hai is typical in the electronics industry, where manufacturing is frequently handled by contract builders.

The working conditions, as described in the British newspaper article, aren't unusual, said Karin Mak, a project coordinator at a nonprofit watchdog organization called Sweatshop Watch.

"It's very common," she said. "These types of conditions are very typical, unfortunately."

Apple's six-page "Supplier Code of Conduct" — posted at http://www.apple.com/environment — would seem to prohibit the sort of treatment described in the article.

"Apple suppliers must uphold the human rights of workers, to treat them with dignity and respect as understood by the international community," reads a passage near the beginning of the document. The guidelines dictate that workers should be restricted to 60-hour workweeks except in unusual circumstances.

Apple has often celebrated its anti-corporate image, with its "Think different" marketing slogan and its use of figures such as John Lennon and Gandhi for ad campaigns.

That Northern California sensibility makes it all the more noticeable when activists accuse Apple of having bad karma.

Over the past year, environmentalists went after Apple for not having a full-fledged computer recycling program, unlike its competitors. In May, Apple beefed up its recycling program, in which customers can recycle old machines for free with the purchase of a new one.

More recently, some activists are going after the company for imposing digital-rights-management software on iTunes and the iPod, which some are portraying as a way to prevent consumers from using other software or hardware to enjoy their music collections in the future. Last weekend, activists turned up at Apple stores in seven cities across the country to protest the company's tactics.

On Mac user Web sites, the debate over the Chinese iPod factory article has some customers accusing the British newspaper of picking on their favorite company's hot product. "I think this is a piece of sensationalist journalism which uses the ipod popularity to make a catchy headline and make a story," wrote one reader at the Web site for Macworld magazine.

Not to put this too delicately but bull Apple did "not know" about the conditions of the factory in China making their products. They ALL know, that is WHY there are here and not in Illinois making them.

I think Apple didn't directly operate this factory. Taiwanese contract manufacturer Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., also known by the brand Foxconn Electronics Inc. did all kinds of dirty works. I don't know Apple has factory in china, I still think most of macs were made in us because Mac is much more expansive than PC.

Mate, under American law all they have to do is stick the nametag on the product inside the US and they can put "Made in USA" on the product. You would be surprised how many products I have seen made here in China that have "Made in the USA" on them. Globalisation.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/06/16/D8I9BVQO0.html

China Builds 51 Dams to Slow Toxic Spill
Jun 16 10:26 AM US/Eastern
Email this story By ALEXA OLESEN
Associated Press Writer

BEIJING

Chinese authorities tried to slow the spread of a toxic spill by building 51 makeshift dams along the tainted river and using fire trucks to pump out polluted water before it reaches a reservoir serving a city of 10 million people, state media said Friday.
The spill of 60 tons of coal tar into the Dasha river in north China's Shanxi province was the latest in a series of mishaps fouling the country's already polluted waterways. Officials said there have been at least 76 water pollution accidents in the last six months.

A villager who lives along the river described seeing dozens of dead fish floating in the water.
In a separate incident Thursday, a series of explosions rocked the Longxin Chemical Plant in the city of Longquan, Zhejiang province, destroying two factories and threatening to contaminate the Oujiang river, which empties into the East China Sea, the official Xinhua News Agency reported.
A spring that feeds the Oujiang lies close to the blast site. Large amounts of sand and stones were trucked to the site in an effort to prevent any waste water from contaminating the river, Xinhua said.
One person was injured and two people were reported missing after the blast, it said.
In the Dasha river spill, a truck overloaded with 60 tons of coal tar _ a substance linked to cancer _ crashed Monday and dumped its contents into the river. Measurements Friday showed that levels of phenol, also known as carbolic acid, were 100 times greater than acceptable levels in some spots.
Cleanup crews scrambled Friday to absorb the toxic substance before it reaches the Wangkuai Reservoir of Baoding, a city of about 10 million people, Xinhua said.
It said a dozen fire engines were pumping polluted water downstream from the spill site and trucking it to a "closed environment" where it could be treated, without giving specifics.
The pollution was said to be traveling about nearly 1 mile per hour downstream toward Baoding, which is about 45 miles from the site of the accident.
The day after the spill, the pollution had reached Hebei's Fuping county, where some 50,000 residents rely on the river for drinking water. Fuping residents were told to take water from nearby reservoirs and seven standby wells until the river could be cleaned, Xinhua said.
Liu Qing, a villager who lives along the Dasha in Fuping, said by telephone that the water was not discolored and did not have any unusual odor but that she had this week noticed dozens of dead fish floating in the river.
Liu said her family normally drinks well water, not water from the river, so they have not been affected.
Another Fuping resident, Li Xingcui, said her family was still using the water to wash vegetables and take baths, ignoring warnings aired on local television. She said the water looked and smelled normal.
Li's family was taking water from a mountain stream for drinking.
Prolonged exposure to coal tar has been linked to increased rates of certain types of cancer but it is also used in small doses as a topical medicine to treat eczema and other skin diseases, according to the World Health Organization's International Agency for Research on Cancer.
Many of China's canals, rivers and lakes are severely tainted by industrial, agricultural and household pollution.
In November, a major chemical spill on the Songhua River halted water supplies to tens of millions in China and Russia. Local authorities were accused of reacting too slowly and delaying public disclosure of the spill.


Not a fun time to be living in China.

it is ****ing crazy situation in there!

She said the water looked and smelled normal

How could she judge if the water was toxic by smelling and looking?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/06/12/wo...12beijing.html

China, Citing Corruption, Fires Olympic Building Chief

By JOSEPH KAHN
Published: June 12, 2006



The official, Liu Zhihua, a vice mayor of Beijing and the chief director of the Beijing 2008 Project Construction Headquarters Office, the agency that supervises the city's massive Olympics-related makeover, is likely to face prosecution and be stripped of his membership in the ruling Communist Party.
The firing is an acute embarrassment for Chinese officials, who had sought to keep tight controls on spending to prevent the graft and bribery allegations that have plagued previous Olympics bids. Officials had promised that the Beijing Olympics would be the "cleanest in history."
The pledge was considered difficult to fulfill, because senior officials in the one-party state have exercised enormous sway over major government-directed projects. China does not have an independent judiciary, and the only check on the authority of party leaders is the party's internal disciplinary mechanism, which is subject to the directive of the country's political leaders.
The Beijing city government was upended in the mid-1990's when its powerful former party chief, Chen Xitong, and another top city official were purged in one of China's biggest corruption scandals.
Like many such crackdowns, the purge and subsequent prosecution of Mr. Chen had its roots in struggles for political power.
It was not immediately clear if Mr. Liu's case involved political maneuvering. But it is often assumed that corruption cases are not exposed publicly unless the individual accused has fallen from grace.
Beijing is in the middle of one of the most ambitious redesigns in its history. The city is spending tens of billions of dollars on Olympics-related construction, transportation and redevelopment projects, many of them monuments to China's new financial power designed by leading European and American architects.
Mr. Liu, 57, has not yet been charged with a crime. The allegations against him were not detailed.
But the New China News Agency said in a dispatch that the city's governing council had concluded that Mr. Liu was "corrupt and degenerate" and that "the reality of his mistakes is clear and the evidence incontrovertible."

this kind of corruption must give CCP a strong headache.