Research Activities
Research Projects
FY 2016/2017 Research Topic: C-29
Young Female Workers in the Spinning Mill Industry in South India: Labour Practices and Problems
Outline
The development of the textile industry has continued as a major export industry in India. Focusing on spinning mills in India, the world’s largest yarn exporter, the Southern state, Tamil Nadu, has some 1,600 spinning mills and employs around 400,000 workers. Sixty percent of these workers are female, and many came from rural districts in search of employment. These spinning mills recruit young females in rural areas under an employment contract practice widely called the Sumangari system in India. The working conditions and wages payment conditions of the Sumangari system have a number of problems. For example, the child labor prohibition laws cannot cover the high-teen female workers. This project seeks to explore the realities of these female workers and search for ways of improving the working conditions.
Period
April 2016 - March 2017
Members of the Research Project
Publications
- Article to be submitted to Asian Economies (Ajia Keizai)