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Nike discloses locations of factories

In response to sit-ins at schools across the nation last spring and accusations of human and labor rights violations, Nike has placed a list of addresses of its factories that produce apparel for five universities on its Web site.

As a part of the agreement between University of Arizona President Peter Likins and Students Against Sweatshops that ended a 10-day sit-in last April in Likins' office lobby, Nike had to disclose the locations of its factories that produce UA apparel by March 1, 2000.

The conditions of the agreement call for full public disclosure of factory addresses, a "living wage" for workers, independent monitoring of the factories and enforcement of the rights of women workers.

Georgetown University, University of Michigan, University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, Duke University and the University of Arizona all have a list of 41 factories in 11 countries on the website. The countries listed include Bangladesh, China, Guatemala, Thailand and the United States.

The Web site's mission statement reports that it "encourages students to criticize Nike more accurately. Nike will share responsibility with our manufacturing partners to continually improve the workplace for every worker manufacturing Nike products."

"The universities requested the information, and that's why we put it up," Nike spokesman Simon Pestridge said yesterday. "There's no real magic to it, we got it up way ahead of schedule."

Avery Kolers, SAS spokesman for the UA, said he is happy with the progress that has been made but there are still concerns.

"While this is a step in the right direction, it doesn't go very far," he said. "Nike doesn't have a track record of being a 100 percent honest."

The UA members of SAS as well as those from other universities have raised questions about the legitimacy of the list.

The Georgetown Solidarity Committee President Laura McSpedon told the school's newspaper, The Hoya, that Nike may have chosen its cleanest and strongest facilities for the list and that it may not be complete. She said that the concern arises from the fact that the exact same factories are listed under each of the universities.

But Pestridge said the list is complete and accurate.

"Those are the factories that make the product for those schools and any accusations are just that - accusations - and are completely false," Pestridge said.

The SAS is now pushing for full disclosure of every factory that Nike does business with.

"When you buy a Nike product you buy the whole process," Kolers said. "It is important that we know the addresses of every factory."

Likins said yesterday he supports Nike's release of the factory addresses.

"I was really pleased that they have decided to disclose unilaterally and not to wait for their competitors to do it," Likins said.

Nike has previously stated that factory addresses could not be released unless all competitors did the same.

Another obligation the UA has created for Nike is the independent monitoring of the factories producing UA apparel. Nike has reacted by saying that it will send students to a factory of their choice.

While the SAS is happy with the progress their organization has helped create, they hold some reservations about what Nike's intentions are.

"This is certainly a significant step and a measured victory for us," Kolers said. "But it's only a small part of what Nike produces."