Where Your Levis are Born

I visited some garment factories here recently. I don't have the stats with me at home, but the garment industry accounts for 73% of Cambodia's exports and 40% of its total economy (that is, GDP). Garments, tourism, and agriculture are really Cambodia's only industries. The vast majority of Cambodian-made garments are exported to the US. In fact, a single U.S. based retailer, The Gap, singlehandedly accounts for 9-10% of Cambodia's GDP.

Anyhow, thought you all might be curious to see where your clothes come from. (Keep in mind that these are top of the line factories in terms of working conditions.)


Fabric is carefully laid into a 1-2 inch thick stack and a pattern--usually drawn onto newsprinter with a fancy computer--laid on top. The cutter uses something that looks like a band saw to cut them out. (At least I think that's similar to what a band saw looks like. It's been a long time since I took woodshop.) Notice the steel mesh glove he's wearing for protection.


This woman is using an industrial-strength sewing machine. She wears a mask over her mouth to keep out dust. Many factories have color-coded bandanas or t-shirts that employees wear to show which product line they are working on.

Here's the machine that puts the rivets in your jeans!

Jobs at a garment factory are very gender stereotyped. The vast majority of workers--including the sewers, ironers, and packers--are women. Men tend to be involved in cutting and packing. Although most garment factory workers are women, most of their union leaders are men.



Garment factories are enormous--this average size one was probably the size of 2 football fields and had about 1000 employees. Some of the largest in Cambodia have 10,000 employees.