WE ARE Penn State students, staff, faculty, and community members. We write to express our grave concern about the abusive treatment of workers in the global supply chain that produces Nittany Lion apparel.

Specifically, we urge you to help redress human and labor rights violations at the Hong Seng Knitting Factory in Bangkok, Thailand, which produces Nike apparel for Penn State and other universities. We call on Penn State's administration to suspend its licensing contract with Nike immediately and not to reinstate it until labor rights violations are remediated satisfactorily. In this case, that means paying the Hong Seng workers the full back wages they are owed.

PENN STATE LICENSEE CODE OF CONDUCT

Penn State values and our affiliation with the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) require university leaders to enforce our licensee code of conduct and ensure that all Penn State logo garments are being produced in just conditions. Penn State is obligated to cut ties with businesses that violate our code of conduct, and the reported wage theft and worker intimidation at Hong Seng, indeed, represents such a violation.

There is recent precedent for such action. In 2013, Penn State suspended its licensing contract with Adidas, helping pressure the company to resolve similar workers’ rights violations at an Indonesian factory. At the time, Vice President for Student Affairs Damon Sims reflected, “Through collaborative effort among students, faculty and administrators, we have been able to bring about a measure of positive change in this case, ensuring that workers' rights remain a top priority for our licensees." Then, in 2015, Penn State terminated licensing agreements with Jansport and other apparel brands that refused to sign onto the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh. It is time for Penn State to take decisive action again to help rectify grievous violations of the rights of the workers who produce our apparel.

BACKGROUND ON HONG SENG KNITTING FACTORY

Recently, the Penn State Chapter of United Students Against Sweatshops received a letter from the Human Rights and Development Foundation on behalf of the workers at the factory detailing worrying conditions that Nike has refused to rectify. According to the letter, at the height of the pandemic, Hong Seng informed its workers, many of whom were Burmese migrants, that they would be required to take “voluntary” leave without pay, rather than suspending them during periods of low production caused by the pandemic. In doing so, the factory evaded provisions in Thai law that would have required paying the workers a portion of their wages during the period of suspension, which the WRC estimates to be about $600,000 in total. When workers refused to take unpaid leave voluntarily, factory management compelled them to sign forms attesting to the fact that they wanted to take unpaid leave, in violation of the law.

In addition to this egregious act of wage theft against vulnerable migrant workers during a period of heightened precarity resulting from the pandemic, factory management also targeted and harassed workers who sought to have their rights respected. After workers reported the scheme to the local labor office and complained about their treatment on Facebook, factory management threatened dismissals and reported one migrant worker to the police. This represented a real danger to the worker in a country where migrant workers are frequently brutalized. In response, the worker and his family were forced to flee to Myanmar in the midst of Covid lockdowns at great personal risk.

Despite knowing about and acknowledging these injustices for over a year, Nike refused to fully remedy these violations and only acted to assist about 1% of impacted workers. Preposterously, Nike maintains that the majority of workers voluntarily chose to take leave and are not entitled to backpay. This position is unacceptable and totally violates our Penn State values.

According to the WRC's online archive, our university was sent a WRC report on this case on April 05, 2021. As an affiliate of the WRC, we hope that you have been closely monitoring this case and ensuring that Nike is compliant with our code of conduct.

We look forward to hearing from you soon and working together to uphold Penn State values.