BEIJING – Mr Xiao Han was just wrapping up the weeklong quarantine that marked the beginning of his latest stint working at the sprawling manufacturing complex in Zhengzhou, China, known as “iPhone city” whenA large part of the 200,000-person workforce had already spent weeks living in forced isolation in trash-filled dormitories, subsisting on meagre rations because management wanted to keep churning out Apple devices while squelching a Covid-19 outbreak.
Then, too, workers clashed with guards over food shortages and living conditions. Workers gave up coveted jobs and, in one case, fled on foot and walked for 40km to get home. Ms Herrero said China’s economy could still take a year to 18 months to open up, and that it is vital that the government communicate clearly that it has a plan to recover.
The Zhengzhou plant produces about 80 per cent of the latest iPhone 14 models, making its continued operation critical for Apple, which warned in November that shipments of its newest iPhones will be lower than expected going into the peak holiday season. Assembly partners such as Foxconn are making more iPhone 14 models in India than any previous generation and are beginning to use India as an export base.
He has helped make every version from the iPhone 5 to the iPhone 14, labouring 10 hours a day as production cranked up for a new model. Foxconn simply did not have the staff to prepare and deliver food boxes multiple times a day. So, meals were mostly given out as workers left the factory, with the intention that they would eat in their dorm rooms.
Security forces run during a protest near Apple supplier Foxconn’s factory in Zhengzhou, China, on Nov 23. PHOTO: REUTERS Mr Zeng was put into isolation three times in one week, he said, even though he ultimately never had Covid-19.Covid-free workers nicknamed colleagues who got Covid-19 “sheep” because the word’s pronunciation is the same as “positive” in Mandarin. The emoji for sheep was also used to represent positive cases on social media to evade censorship from Chinese social media platforms that were deleting posts related to tensions at iPhone city.
One night, some of his neighbours could not navigate their way back to the village. They ended up sleeping in an alley outside a building housing a production line where US$1,000 iPhones are made.
Source: News Formal (newsformal.com)
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