Walmart and Centric Brands are investigating their supply chains in Cambodia over allegations that inmates at the country's largest women's prison were illegally employed to produce garments for export, following questions posed by Reuters and inquiries from a U.S. industry group about labour practices there.
The American Apparel and Footwear Association wrote to Cambodia's ambassador to Washington, Keo Chhea, in November, expressing "strong concerns regarding credible reports" that inmates at Correctional Center 2 , near Phnom Penh, were producing garments and other textile products for export, including to the U.S., as part of a rehabilitation program.
The companies, which Sopheak confirmed were W Dexing Garment , IGTM and Chia Ho Garment Industrial, did not respond to requests for comment. Reuters could not determine which hotels ordered the slippers. The people showed Reuters a reusable Walmart-branded shopping bag and a polo shirt with IZOD branding which they said were made in the prison factories where the inmates had worked and which they said they brought out with them upon their release, the most recent in January. Reuters is not disclosing their identities, nor those of two other inmates interviewed for this report, due to concerns about their safety.
Centric told Reuters in an email in June that it had "placed on hold" imports from a factory in Cambodia and would "immediately terminate" any supplier found to be using prison labour. It said in early August that it "has not found any evidence supporting the claim that prison labor was used" to make the polo shirt in question but had "terminated" its relationship with the factory, which it would not identify.
Once a year BFC conducts unannounced, two-day assessments of all Cambodian factories that produce garments and travel goods for export, said the ILO, which helps run the monitoring initiative. "We didn't want to work but we had to work. When we were in the prison we were equal to zero," said one former inmate.
Cambodia's Ministry of Interior, the General Department of Prisons and the official in charge of CC2 at the time, Klot Dara, did not respond to requests for comment. Reuters could not determine who owned the factories or details of their arrangement with the prison.
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