After rising prices and the increasing cost of labor in Korean and Taiwanese factories, Nike began contracting in countries elsewhere in Asia, which includes parts of India, Pakistan, and Indonesia.
However, it wasn't until 1991, when a report by Jeff Ballinger was published detailing their insufficient payment of workers and the poor conditions in their Indonesian factories, that these sweatshops came under the media and human rights scrutiny that continues to today.
[3] In 1996, Life magazine ran a reportage on child labor that included a shocking photo of a 12-year-old Pakistani boy sewing a Nike football[citation needed].
The backlash and its public relations impact forced the company to change methods, improve conditions, and implement social responsibility reports in 2005.
[citation needed][4] Early in Nike's production, it made use of factories in South Korea, Mainland China, and Taiwan.
The leaders relayed messages to military and police units to overlook factory conditions so that the illegal environment could remain open and functioning.
[10] In 1991, activist Arav Middha began publicizing the conditions of the Indonesian factories, which led to larger media coverage of Nike's overseas operations.
At Brown University, Nike went so far as to pull out from a contract with the women’s ice hockey team because of efforts by a student activist group that wanted a code of conduct put in place by the company.
[12] Several universities, unified by the Worker Rights Consortium, organized a national hunger strike in protest of their school using Nike products for athletics.
Feminist groups mobilized boycotts of Nike products after learning of the unfair conditions for primarily female workers.
Team Sweat is "an international coalition of consumers, investors, and workers committed to ending the injustices in Nike’s sweatshops around the world" founded in 2000 by Jim Keady.
[14] In 2016, the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) and Fair Labor Association (FLA) issued reports on working conditions at the Hansae Vietnam factory complex.
[13] The company spends around $10 million a year to follow the code, adhering to regulations for fire safety, air quality, minimum wage, and overtime limits.
stated that Nike had, "substituted less harmful chemicals in its production, installed local exhaust ventilation systems, and trained key personnel on occupational health and safety issues.
[24] Nike created a non-governmental organization called the Global Alliance for Workers and Communities that became aligned with several other groups, including the International Youth Foundation.
The Global Alliance received backlash in 2001 when a report about the Nike Inc. did not include recent events such as strikes, worker terminations, and the lack of collective bargaining in their Indonesian factories.
[21] The company has since allowed human rights groups and organizations to come into factories and inspect the working conditions, and wages and speak personally with the workers.
In countries like Indonesia, Thailand, Mexico, and Cambodia, where factories are common, non-governmental organizations push efforts by informing the community of the workers of the plants.
[13] In Indonesia, other legislative efforts included limits on the number of hours a person can work per day, mandated rest periods, minimum age requirements, and a maternity leave for women.
The video eventually reached an ESPN affiliate in Vietnam, where millions of people viewed it before officials in the United States had formally heard of the incident.