Shoes, Glues, and Homework

This study of working conditions in shoemaking in the informal sector in Indonesia and the Philippines, along with their gender dimensions and national and international policy implications, is based on the author's experience in both countries during 2002, with applied qualitative research techniques: in-depth interviews and worksite visits. The use of organic solvents makes shoemaking a particularly hazardous occupation. The book illustrates the global need for safe and healthy chemical alternatives and for their introduction at the beginning of use and supply chain applications. The study also presents the complexity of the problem when considering the introduction of safer alternatives at the source. While home-based shoemakers may influence certain aspects of their work environment, they seldom can undertake efficient preventive measures to mitigate chemical and dust exposures at the bottom of the production process. Homes have been converted into unsafe footwear-manufacturing units, with serious solvent and dust exposures and a spectrum of other hazards. All family members, adults and children, may work in home-based footwear production. Low-cost shoe production takes advantage of sex-segregated job tasks and minimal investments in working conditions.Use of chemicals in shoemaking is just one example of how global markets have introduced chemicals, materials, and production processes into developing nations. Hazardous working conditions and inadequate health protection are the product of complex relationships among diverse "actors" or agents at international, national, community, and industry levels.

Dr. Pia Markkanen is a chemical engineer and occupational safety and health specialist with 15 years of international experience in analyzing work environments. She is a research professor in the Department of Work Environment, University of Massachusetts Lowell, and research scientist in the U.S. NIOSH-funded Project SHARRP (Safe Homecare and Risk Reduction for Providers), based at the Lowell Center for Sustainable Production. She earned a doctorate in work environment from UMASS Lowell in 2004 and master's of science in chemical engineering from Lappeenranta University of Technology, Finland, in 1992. Dr. Markkanen has worked in occupational health in Cambodia, China, Indonesia, Mongolia, Nepal, the Philippines, Switzerland, Thailand, and Viet Nam. During 2000-2004, she worked in the ILO's International Programme for the Elimination of Child Labour in the areas of shoemaking, deep-sea fishing, and agriculture. She investigated working conditions of home-based shoemakers in her doctoral dissertation project. In her current work at Project SHARRP she continues to explore the home work environment in the global economy and to challenge why the home setting is not recognized as a real workplace and is thus unprotected from hazardous exposures.