Working Overtime for Stability
A young deputy township head in Sichuan recently posted an open resignation letter expressing disillusionment with issues including the constant distraction of “stability preservation” work. At China Media Project,...
Jul 8, 2013
A young deputy township head in Sichuan recently posted an open resignation letter expressing disillusionment with issues including the constant distraction of “stability preservation” work. At China Media Project,...
Jun 4, 2013
The death toll from a fire at a Jilin slaughterhouse on Monday has risen to at least 120, prompting the detention of a senior official at the plant’s operator, anger on the part of bereaved relatives, and a call from the...
Dec 18, 2012
Reuters reports an accident at a steel plant in Shanghai has killed two workers and injured 13 others. The plant is owned by Baosteel, one of China’s largest steel companies: Two workers were killed and 13 injured when a...
Nov 7, 2012
The following examples of censorship instructions, issued to the media and/or Internet companies...
Nov 20, 2009
A mine explosion in Heilongjiang has killed 10, and trapped 114. From Cara Anna, for Associated Press: A gas explosion tore through a coal mine in northern China on Saturday, killing 15 people and trapping another 114 nearly a...
Oct 17, 2009
The Economist reports on the government’s steps to improve coal mine safety: An accident that killed more than 270 people at an iron-ore mine in Shanxi in September last year may have been the turning-point, or so...
Oct 8, 2009
From BBC News: The collapse of two lift cages in a mine in central China has killed 26 men and injured five others. The accident occurred in Lengshuijiang city in Hunan province when the lift brakes failed, the official Xinhua...
Oct 23, 2008
David Bandurski from China Media Project writes on a story appearing in The Shanxi Daily on October 4, 2008. The story details the mayor of Changzhi giving out namecards so residents can call the mayor and the Party secretary to...
Jan 30, 2008
According to Reuters, in 2007, a total of 101,480 Chinese died in workplace accidents — including 81,649 deaths from road accidents. China’s Olympics aquatic center, the “Water Cube,” opens as the...
Jan 28, 2008
From the BBC: China has admitted that six workers have been killed on Olympic Games construction projects since 2003. Until now, Beijing had denied there had been any fatalities on the building sites being readied for this...
Jan 23, 2008
Reuters says that China promises to investigate reports of a cover up of construction workers’ deaths on the Olympic Stadium construction site: – Read also China Crackdown on Work Accidents by BBC, via CDT
Jan 22, 2008
From abc3340.com: China’s senior safety inspector urged the public and the media Tuesday to expose workplace accidents in a bid to end corruption and official misdeeds aggravating the country’s high rate of work deaths. Li Yizhong, the head of the State Administration of Work Safety, said public whistle-blowing provides crucial clues for investigators often hobbled […]
Jan 22, 2008
From BBC News: Dozens of Chinese officials are to be prosecuted or punished over fatal accidents in the workplace – where 100,000 Chinese die each year. Works Minister Wang Wei announced that prosecutors would consider cases against 78 managers and officials, and 105 had already been disciplined. The move comes after inquiries into five incidents […]
Jan 16, 2008
A human story of industrial pollution and its threats to public health, even for white-collar professionals. From the Wall Street Journal: Cadmium batteries are safe to use. They are also cheap, saving American parents about $1.50 on the average toy, compared with pricier batteries. But cadmium batteries can be hazardous to make. In southern China, […]
Jan 11, 2008
Xinhua reports on the number of accidental deaths in China. From Xinhua: A senior official with the Chinese work safety watchdog said Friday that 101,480 people died in workplace and transportation accidents in 2007, down 10.1 percent year on year. “The production safety situation is improving nationwide, but relevant agencies still shoulder arduous tasks in […]
Jan 5, 2008
From The New York Times: Nearly a decade after some of the most powerful companies in the world — often under considerable criticism and consumer pressure — began an effort to eliminate sweatshop labor conditions in Asia, worker abuse is still commonplace in many of the Chinese factories that supply Western companies, according to labor […]
Nov 20, 2007
Please click here to read the 7-part series “American Imports, Chinese Deaths” – A Salt Lake Tribune Special Report: The patients arrive every day in Chinese hospitals with disabling and fatal diseases, acquired while making products for America. On the sixth floor of the Guangzhou Occupational Disease and Prevention Hospital, Wei Chaihua, 44, sits on […]
Nov 5, 2007
From AP: A five-year campaign to improve China’s notoriously deadly industrial safety record is seeing results, with accidental deaths falling by 13.9 percent in the first ten months of this year, the country’s top safety official said Monday. Since the institution of the Safety Production Law in 2003, the number of accidental deaths has fallen […]