Challenging the treatment of China’s migrant workers
‘Qing Tong’ is a 28-year-old blogger who just like millions of other people in China left her rural home to work in the giant factories which feed the rest of the world's appetite for cars, furniture, electronic goods and toys.
At the age of 17 Qing had to drop out of high school and move away from home to find work to pay for her father’s medical treatment. She got a job on a production line in an electronics firm and spent the next ten years working in various factories in China, including a stint as a supervisor at Foxconn, where a spate of suicides this year brought international attention to factory floor conditions there.
She decided to write a blog about her experiences which proved so popular with fellow migrant workers that it led to a book deal. Last month that book, which is called ‘From The Wolf's Burrow into The Tiger's Den’ became a bestseller in China.
She talks to Matthew Bannister about her personal experiences of long days at work, timed toilet breaks and the new turn her life has taken.
First broadcast on 11 August 2010