Report warns of automation risk to jobs in Asia - sportstextiles: Lea SportsTextiles

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Report warns of automation risk to jobs in Asia

18/07/2016
A report from the International Labour Organisation (ILO) says that nearly 90% of garment and footwear jobs in Cambodia and Vietnam could be at risk due to the increase in automation of assembly lines.

The ILO identified workers in textiles, garments and footwear within the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (Asean) economic area as the most at risk. This region also included Indonesia, Thailand and Malaysia. There are 9 million people in this region who depend on the garment manufacturing industry for work, according to the report.

The ILO said that even though automated assembly lines are unlikely to be used in Asia, their installation in Europe and the US poses a large risk. It urged Asean countries to start planning to diversify to “avoid considerable setbacks in development”.

Jae-Hee Chang, one of the authors of the report, recommended that the region’s garment factories abandon their “export-oriented” model in favour of supplying the growing middle classes of the Asean area.

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