“Immigrant textile workers in Italy win eight-hour day!”
IN ITALY’S industrial heartland, immigrant textile workers have launched a wave of coordinated strikes that have forced dozens of factories to concede basic labour rights, demanding an end to 14-hour shifts and winning the right to a 40-hour work week.
In just 14 weeks, 68 out of 70 targeted factories in Prato — Europe’s largest textile hub — have agreed to implement ‘8×5’: eight-hour days, five days a week.
The movement, organised by the independent base union SUDD Cobas, marks the culmination of seven years of worker-led organising in one of Italy’s most exploitative sectors.
Prato is home to more than 7,000 textile and garment businesses, employing around 43,000 people, many of them migrants from South and East Asia.
These companies are often small, specialising in single stages of fashion production such as sewing, dyeing, twisting yarn, or garment logistics.
Despite their size, they generate nearly 2 billion euros in annual exports under the ‘Made in Italy’ fashion label…
The march began at Teresa Moda, site of the 2013 fatal fire, and attracted workers from Pakistan, Bangladesh, Afghanistan, and India, as well as students and activists from Pisa and Lucca…