Bicycle maker Giant Manufacturing Co (巨大) said yesterday it has begun reimbursing migrant workers for expenses they paid to secure their jobs and pledged not to deduct future broker fees from their wages.
The move comes after the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) issued a Withhold Release Order (WRO) covering bicycles, parts and accessories made by Giant in Taiwan, due to allegations of forced labor.
The CBP said an investigation into Giant identified indicators including “abuse of vulnerability, abusive working and living conditions, debt bondage, withholding of wages, and excessive overtime.”
Photo: Ritchie B. Tongo, EPA-EFE
The CBP order does not apply to products made by Giant’s factories outside Taiwan. The company also has manufacturing facilities in China, Vietnam, Hungary and the Netherlands.
In a news release issued on Wednesday, Giant announced that it had expanded its “Zero Recruitment Fee Policy” to all current migrant workers and began reimbursing past fees to them this week.
Previously applicable only to migrant workers newly recruited since Jan. 1 this year, the policy requires the company to “bear all recruitment fees, service charges and related government costs,” the release read.
In a reply to CNA yesterday, Giant said “partial reimbursements” had been issued to migrant workers recruited before Jan. 1, beginning on Tuesday.
However, the company did not respond to CNA’s inquiries about the amount to be reimbursed in the first phase or how many phases there will be.
It said the reimbursement covers fees paid by migrant workers in both their home countries and Taiwan during hiring, including broker fees, service charges, visa and document processing fees, medical examination costs and transportation expenses.
Before the policy was rolled out and expanded, migrant workers typically paid those fees either upfront with loans before being hired or through salary deductions after starting work, and brokers collected most of them.
Giant told CNA that starting on Wednesday, it will “no longer deduct any related fees from wages.”
“Salaries will be paid by the company, in accordance with the law, directly into each migrant worker’s personal account, with no deductions for any recruitment-related items,” the company added.
The Chinese-language Commercial Times on Wednesday last week, citing industry estimates, reported that if employers cover migrant workers’ agency and processing fees in both their home countries and in Taiwan, the average cost would be about NT$150,000 to NT$200,000 (US$4,893 to US$6,525) per worker.
Asked by CNA about the figure, Giant said it was “the media’s own estimate based on general market rates, which we cannot confirm.”
According to Giant, a third-party adviser it has commissioned “to identify, assess and develop a comprehensive compensation plan” for migrant workers hired before Jan. 1 this year, will determine the final amount.
As of this month, Giant employs 545 migrant workers, 406 from Thailand and 139 from Vietnam.
The company said it would continue using licensed agencies while also considering direct hiring.
“Regardless of the hiring channel, all fees will be fully borne by the company and not by employees,” Giant said, adding that it has begun evaluating and updating contracts with partner brokers to ensure they meet “ethical recruitment” and “worker-pays-zero” standards.
In the Wednesday statement, the company said it has also completed the relocation of all migrant worker dormitories, with over 400 workers having moved into two newly built facilities “designed and upgraded in line with international labor and human rights standards.”
Giant told CNA those standards draw on the “spirit” of the International Labour Organization’s (ILO) “Fair Recruitment Initiative” and the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights.
“All dormitories have passed fire, building and public-safety inspections and provide reasonable living space, private bathrooms, and dining and leisure facilities,” it added.
Jason Lee (李正新), a social worker at the Rerum Novarum Center, said that Giant’s approach does not address the root cause and could prompt brokers in workers’ home countries to invent new charges and additional fees.
Having worked with migrant workers in Taiwan for years, Lee noted that they face many expenses even before leaving their home countries — including training, lodging, food, airfare and processing fees — and that brokers could tack on other fees at that stage.
“Giant’s approach will disrupt the entire ecosystem,” he said, suggesting that the brokerage system “should be directly abolished.”
Lee said migrant workers’ loan repayments are deducted from their monthly wages, but their loan situations differ, with some borrowing from banks or other institutions, and home-country broker fees also vary, and urged Giant to specify exactly how much it will cover.
Sweeping policy changes under US Secretary of Health and Human Services Robert F. Kennedy Jr are having a chilling effect on vaccine makers as anti-vaccine rhetoric has turned into concrete changes in inoculation schedules and recommendations, investors and executives said. The administration of US President Donald Trump has in the past year upended vaccine recommendations, with the country last month ending its longstanding guidance that all children receive inoculations against flu, hepatitis A and other diseases. The unprecedented changes have led to diminished vaccine usage, hurt the investment case for some biotechs, and created a drag that would likely dent revenues and
Macronix International Co (旺宏), the world’s biggest NOR flash memory supplier, yesterday said it would spend NT$22 billion (US$699.1 million) on capacity expansion this year to increase its production of mid-to-low-density memory chips as the world’s major memorychip suppliers are phasing out the market. The company said its planned capital expenditures are about 11 times higher than the NT$1.8 billion it spent on new facilities and equipment last year. A majority of this year’s outlay would be allocated to step up capacity of multi-level cell (MLC) NAND flash memory chips, which are used in embedded multimedia cards (eMMC), a managed
CULPRITS: Factors that affected the slip included falling global crude oil prices, wait-and-see consumer attitudes due to US tariffs and a different Lunar New Year holiday schedule Taiwan’s retail sales ended a nine-year growth streak last year, slipping 0.2 percent from a year earlier as uncertainty over US tariff policies affected demand for durable goods, data released on Friday by the Ministry of Economic Affairs showed. Last year’s retail sales totaled NT$4.84 trillion (US$153.27 billion), down about NT$9.5 billion, or 0.2 percent, from 2024. Despite the decline, the figure was still the second-highest annual sales total on record. Ministry statistics department deputy head Chen Yu-fang (陳玉芳) said sales of cars, motorcycles and related products, which accounted for 17.4 percent of total retail rales last year, fell NT$68.1 billion, or
In the wake of strong global demand for AI applications, Taiwan’s export-oriented economy accelerated with the composite index of economic indicators flashing the first “red” light in December for one year, indicating the economy is in booming mode, the National Development Council (NDC) said yesterday. Moreover, the index of leading indicators, which gauges the potential state of the economy over the next six months, also moved higher in December amid growing optimism over the outlook, the NDC said. In December, the index of economic indicators rose one point from a month earlier to 38, at the lower end of the “red” light.
RSS