Publisher's Synopsis
The past decade has seen burgeoning investment across Africa by private and state-run Chinese enterprises. This report examines the labor practices of a Chinese state-owned enterprise in four copper mining operations in Zambia. While Zambia's copper miners welcome Chinese-run companies' substantial investment and job creation, they also encounter abusive employment conditions that violate national and international standards and fall short of practices among the other multinationals operating in Zambia's copper mining industry. Miners at Chinese-run companies described consistently poor health and safety standards, including inadequate ventilation that can lead to serious lung diseases, hours of work in excess of Zambian law, the failure to replace workers' damaged protective equipment, and routine threats of being fired should they refuse to work in unsafe places. These practices, combined with the already dangerous nature of the work,
