The Toyoda Gosei plant, in the northern port city of Tianjin
close to Beijing, was shut down on Tuesday by a strike, a company spokesman
said but added that employees went back to work the next day after managers
agreed to discuss wage increases.
Outside the plant on Thursday morning, sounds of clanging
and electric grinders could be heard from its main workshop, but some workers
said they had not returned to the production line.
"We're not working today. We were on strike," one
middle-aged female employee leaving the factory gate told Reuters.
"It's been a tense day. We've been discussing
wages," she said, adding before she was ordered away from reporters that
part of the problem was no workers wanted to come forward as leaders.
Some workers, unhappy about pay were on a go-slow, or
continuing to strike, others said as they left the factory in an industrial
estate on the outskirts of the city.
The stoppage is the latest in a string of walkouts that in
recent weeks has paralyzed several factories across China.
The unusual display of worker assertiveness is sensitive for
the ruling Communist Party, which fears movements that could undermine its legitimacy
or grip on power. It has also raised questions about China's future as a
low-cost manufacturing base.
Guards prevented other workers at the Toyota supplier from
speaking to journalists, who were also told not to linger nearby.
The firm, 43 percent owned by Toyota Motor and a supplier of
items such as door components for compact cars, has not fallen behind its
production schedule because it canceled a holiday on Wednesday, the spokesman
said.
A Toyota Motor spokeswoman also said her company keeps some
spare parts in inventory to allow it to cope with unexpected situations at its
main auto plants in Tianjin.
The commentary on treatment of migrant workers in the
People's Daily newspaper, which acts as a channel for government thinking, did
not mention the recent strikes.
But echoing comments by Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao earlier
in the week, its author said the time had come to narrow the rich-poor gulf,
which it added was stifling consumer demand.
The "made-in-China" model is "facing a
turning point," said the newspaper. It urged improved conditions for the
migrant workers whose cheap labor has powered China's export-led growth.
"What is important is achieving a relatively big
improvement in the lives of ordinary people, especially wage laborers and their
families," added Tang Jun, a social policy researcher at the Chinese
Academy of Social Sciences, a government think tank.
Also on Thursday, a branch of US fast food restaurant KFC
signed a collective labor contract in which it agreed to raise minimum wages by
200 yuan ($29.27) a month, as demanded by a local trade union, the official
Xinhua agency said.
The sympathetic account of worker grievances in the state
media suggests that Beijing wants to avoid outright confrontation with the
workers and may welcome some concessions.
The highest profile stoppage has been at a factory in
southern Guangdong province that makes locks for Honda Motor vehicles, where
hundreds of employees have returned to work after days of protests, pending an
outcome from negotiations on Friday.
The strike at Honda Lock was the third to hit a Honda parts
supplier in China. The other two, at suppliers producing exhausts and
transmissions, were settled after workers received pay rises.
Chinese media coverage of the strikes has been limited and
analysts say there is little danger of them sparking a wider workers rights
movement.
"There is a small risk that such disputes could spiral
out of control, but an even smaller risk that they will lead to wider political
instability," Eurasia Group analyst Michal Meidan wrote in a recent note.
