Chinese and Indian factory photos
This pack contains three parts:
1) An extended set of exhibits from the paper
2) Some additional photos from Indian textile factories, from visits I made
to Tarapur (near Mumbai) in August 2010
3) Some additional photos from Chinese textile factories from visits I
made to Shengzezhen (near Shanghai) in August 2010
You are welcome to use any photos that might be helpful for research,
presentations, teaching etc
Nick Bloom, Stanford University, August 2010
nbloom@stanford.edu
Extended exhibits
Additional Indian photos
Additional Chinese photos
Exhibit 1: Factories are large compounds containing several buildings.
Factory surrounded by extensive grounds
A group of three buildings within a factory compound
Factory offices (left) and goods loading bay (right)
Factory entrance with gates and a guard post
Exhibit 2: These factories operate 24 hours a day for 7 days a week
producing fabric from yarn, with 4 main stages of production
(1) Winding the yarn thread onto the warp beam
(2) Drawing the warp beam ready for weaving
(3) Weaving the fabric on the weaving loom
(4) Quality checking and repair
Exhibit 3: Many parts of these factories were dirty and unsafe
Garbage outside the factory
Garbage inside a factory
Flammable garbage in a factory
Chemicals without any covering
Exhibit 4: The factory floors were disorganized
Fire
extinguisher 3
years past its
service date
Instrument
not
removed
after use,
blocking
hallway.
Dirty and
poorly
maintained
machines
Old warp
beam, chairs
and a desk
obstructing the
factory floor
Tools left on
the floor
after use
Exhibit 5: The inventory rooms had months of excess yarn, often without
any formal storage system or protection from damp
Yarn without
labeling, order or
damp protection
Different types
and colors of
yarn lying mixed
Yarn piled up so
high and deep that
access to back
sacks is almost
impossible
Exhibit 6: The parts stores were also disorganized and dirty
Spares without any labeling or order
No protection to prevent damage and rust
Spares without any labeling or order
Shelves overfilled and disorganized
Exhibit 7: The path for materials flow was often obstructed
Unfinished rough path along which 6 heavy warp
beams were taken on wheeled trolleys every day to
the elevator, which led down to the looms.
This steep slope, rough surface and sharp angle
meant workers often lost control of the trolleys. They
crashed into the girder or wall, eventually breaking
the trolleys. So now each beam is carried by 6 men.
A broken trolley (the wheel snapped off)
At another factory both warp beam elevators had
broken down due to poor maintenance. As a result
teams of 7 men carried several warps beams down
the stairs every day. This was slow and dangerous,
with two serious accidents in our time at the factory.
Exhibit 8: Routine maintenance was usually not carried out, with repairs
only undertaken when breakdowns arose, leading to frequent stoppages.
Warp beam being unloaded off a broken loom
Parts being cleaned and replaced on jammed loom
Workers investigating a broken loom
Loom parts being disassembled for diagnosis
Exhibit 9: Quality was so poor that about 20% of manpower was spent on
repairing defects at the end of the production process
Large room full of repair workers (the day shift)
Workers spread cloth over lighted plates to spot defects
Defects are repaired by hand or cut out from cloth
Non-fixable defects lead to discounts of up to 75%
Extended exhibits
Additional Indian photos
Additional Chinese photos
The weaving looms are typically bough second hand from Europe & US
USA
Italy
Germany
UK
Producing cloth involves first getting the warp yarn aligned and then
weaving the weft yarn at right angles
After
weaving
(adding the
weft yarn)
there are
threads in
two
directions,
hence the
check
pattern
Before weaving
there is warp
yarn only
(threads in just
one direction)
Typical Indian factory scene – somewhat chaotic but working
Better organized factories have areas demarked with lines, and use
trolleys to move equipment round only in these areas
Offices have some basic computer equipment (this was one of the most
high tech firms, most have two or three PCs which are about 5 years old)
The ERP operator in one of the firms who had been kindly providing us
with the weekly performance data
Almost all the non-management labor in Tarapur (near Mumbai) were
migrants from the North West (Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Orissa etc).
Factory workers usually share rooms in town or live in make-shift
accommodation – this is a typical building and mess surrounding it
Typical scenes near factories in Tarapur (4 hours north of Mumbai). In
Mumbai you never see any green space like this as land is too expensive
In fact the only time
I ever saw a piece
of open space in
Mumbai during a
visit in 2008. It was
about 1 acre of
scrub-land with
almost 100 people
appearing to be
playing one huge
game of football on
it. Saurabh (who I
was travelling with)
corrected me – it
was not one game
of football, but
about 10 games of
cricket, with these
all criss-crossing
each other. So you
have to be sure
which ball went
with which game.
No wonder Indian
cricketers are so
good!
More typical scenes near the factory
On the right you
can see the
ubiquitous autorickshaws
(nicknamed
“autos”). They are
basically
motorbikes with a
chassis around
them to act as a
taxi. These are
very common
across developing
Asia – for example
the Tuttuts of
Thailand.
Interestingly, these
are banned now in
central Mumbai,
and also in many
Chinese cities (like
Shanghai) due to
pollution and safety
concerns.
Typical view from the factory window (a chemical factory)
You also notice an amazing amount of stuff on the streets – here some
concrete pipes are either abandoned or awaiting sale
Advert near a factory - for some reason there is no economics offered?
Weavers walk or cycle to work
Signs like this in the factory are very standard – when banks make loans
they use the buildings and equipment as collateral, and check monthly
Some of the equipment is ancient – this is a 30 year old warping loom
Workers constructing an effluent treatment plant (to reduce pollution from
dyeing chemicals). Apparently required for exporting to Europe.
Fabric dyeing vats (fabric in put inside with dyes, heated and stirred)
Firms made fabric for shirts, suits and furnishing (shown here). This is
then used as an input by the apparel and furnishings industry .
Jacquard looms (more advanced, requiring double height ceilings)
Plant managers office – pretty basic and very noisy (70 weaving looms are
behind the camera). The low ceiling second floor above houses mending.
Some factories have been buying new hi-tech equipment – this is a
horizontal embroidery machine (the design is shown on the LCD).
A warp beam on a trolley. Warp beams contain yarn woven in one
direction (the warp) and to make fabric need yarn woven in the other
direction (the weft). There are hundreds of these beams in typical factory.
The Accenture team arriving at one of the factories. These are
gated, primarily to check workers on exit to limit theft
Finally, firms often have problems with unions so resort a
variety of unusual hiring practices (a non-union monkey)
Note: intended as a joke! Photo courtesy of Kevin Boudreau from a metal forging firm
Extended exhibits
Additional Indian photos
Additional Chinese photos
Chinese factories were more modern buildings with notably
more cars (and almost no bicycles)
When I visited China in 1992 and 1994 there were bikes everywhere just like
India, now they are almost completely gone
Factories are large, spacious and well laid out – in fact they
look cleaner than many US and UK factories I’ve seen
Chinese Factories also had much less manpower – typically
one worker per 10 looms (one per four looms in India)
The looms were all purchased new – in this case from Toyota
Chinese factories had better worker facilities (water coolers,
worker canteens etc.) although like India the workers were
there 7 days a week for 8 to 12 hours each
A Chinese worker checking quality on the loom – a basic
piece of Lean manufacturing (check quality before the end)
This type of thing was
a stark contrast to
India, where I never
saw a worker checking
fabric on the loom (in
China I saw this in
every factory I visited).
This is part of the
broader Lean mentality
of fixing problems as
rapidly as possible
Another Chinese worker checking quality on the loom – this
time for a cotton loom (the picture before is for polyester)
Polyester is much
easier to work
with (breaks less
and does not
produce nasty lint
that covers the
factory). But
polyester retails
at a discount to
cotton, so both
types of yarn are
used, often in
composite
materials.
Chinese factories had about 70% women. In India women
only worked in checking and repair (more dexterous work)
All employees I saw in
China were young
(less than 30 I would
guess) so there is
clearly a demographic
question here about
where are the older
workers, and what
happens when these
workers age? I India I
saw many more
middle aged and even
older workers in the
factories (although
almost all men outside
mending)
A warp sizing machine (wraps the yarn around warp beams
plus starches it to increase yarn strength)
So much cotton dust in some corners of the factory that it
looks like it’s snowing
In early 1800s
Victorian cotton
mills this fluff
would get in
workers lungs
and cause longrun lung damage
and eventually
death. I presume
(hope) it’s no
longer such a
serious problem,
but the factories
are typically very
dusty because of
this.
This is despite the air filters and cleaning that occurs
Textile mills tend to cluster – this was across the road for the
factory we visited in Shengzezhen (near Shanghai)
Drawing – this is labor intensive but machines do exist to do
this, but are currently too expensive to be worthwhile
The weaver of the month showing of his machine