VOA常速英语2014 试点项目为柬埔寨服装工人增加营养

Pilot Project to Boost Nutrition for Cambodian Garment Workers 试点项目为柬埔寨服装工人增加营养

PHNOM PENH— 

A study by the International Labor 1 Organization, the U.N.’s labor body, shows most Cambodian garment workers do not eat enough nutritious 2 food and that, as a result, many are anemic and even underweight. Now, a pilot project will feed workers at five factories a free daily meal for the next year and measure their health and productivity. The idea is to persuade factories and the Cambodian government of the economic benefit of providing free meals.

It’s 11 a.m. outside the Gladpeer garment factory in Phnom Penh, and workers stream out to buy lunch from roadside vendors 3.

早上11点，金边Gladpeer服装厂外，工人们蜂拥出来在路边小贩那里购买午餐。

Among them is 21-year-old Phon Chany. She earns $130 a month working up to 14 hours a day, $20 goes on rent and electricity, and $50 to support her parents and seven siblings 4 in their village. That doesn’t leave much. To get by, Chany scrimps on food - which brings other costs.

其中就有21岁的Phon Chany，她每天工作14小时，每月挣130美元，其中20美元用于房租和电费，50美元用来补贴在村里的父母，甚至7个兄弟姐妹。这样剩下的就不多了，要勉强过活，Chany只得在食物上精打细算，但这样也带来了其他代价。

“I regularly get fevers and headaches - firstly because I don’t eat enough, and secondly 5 because I work long hours and don’t get enough sleep,” she said.

“我总会发烧和头疼，一是因为吃的不够，二是因为工作时间长，而且睡眠不足。”

Cambodia’s garment sector 6 is worth $5.5 billion annually 7. Some 600 factories produce for brands like Levi-Strauss, H&M, and Walmart. But the sector’s 600,000 workers, mainly young women like Chany, struggle on the $100-monthly minimum wage.

柬埔寨的服装厂每年创造55亿美元的价值，大约600家工厂为李维·史特劳斯、H&M和沃玛特等品牌制造产品。但这个行业的60万名工人，主要是像Chany这样的年轻女性，却要为每月100美元的最低工资辛苦干活。

The ILO’s study of nearly 4,000 workers found 43 percent are anemic, and 15 percent are underweight.

世界劳工组织对近4000名工人的调查发现有43%的人患有贫血，15%的人体重不足。

Although Cambodian garment workers have the benefit of a monthly paycheck, their health metrics were, unexpectedly, no better than the rest of the population in the impoverished 8 country.

尽管柬埔寨服装工人每月能领到薪水，但出人意料的是，他们的健康状况并不比这个贫困国家其他人口要好。

“Also we were surprised at how little workers spend on food. So they are saying that on average they are spending about $9 a week, or $36 a month, but they make much more than that. So they’re sending a lot of money home and using it for other purposes," explained Jill Tucker, International labor organization. "Workers are essentially 9 starving themselves so that they can contribute to their families’ welfare.”

国际劳工组织的吉尔·塔克说，“我们也吃惊工人们在食物上花的钱很少，他们说平均每周花9美元买食物，也就是每月36美元，但他们挣的要比这个多很多。所以他们将很多钱给家人和其他用途。工人们基本上是在挨饿，所以他们能给家人带来福利。”

For the next year, workers at five factories will get one free meal a day; workers at another five will not. The ILO will measure the health and productivity outcomes.

明年，5家工厂的工人们每天将得到一份免费的食物，另外5家工厂的工人没有这个机会。世界劳工组织将研究健康状况和生产力情况。

Dave Welsh heads the Solidarity 10 Center, a group affiliated 11 to the U.S. labor movement. Welsh says the impact of the nutrition project and the ongoing 12 talks to boost the minimum wage mean Cambodia has the chance to deliver on its reputation as hosting a model industry.

戴夫·威尔士就职于团结中心，这是一家隶属于美国劳工运动的组织。威尔士说这个营养项目和正在进行的意在提高最低工资的对话将意味着柬埔寨有机会提高其作为榜样工厂所在地的声誉。

“It’s not just increasing the monetary 13 amount of the minimum wage, but looking at subsidizing where most of those expenses go to, and, currently, most of those expenses go to housing for sub-standard housing and food for sub-standard nutrition that’s provided to workers. If you eliminated the nutrition aspect of that, it could arguably be a saving of as much as 50 percent of what workers are currently earning,” Welsh said.

“不仅仅是提高最低工资，也要看补贴情况，大多数补贴目前用在不合标准房屋上，用于不合标准的食物项目上。如果能解决掉营养问题，那就帮助工人们省掉了50%的收入。”

A daily free meal and a higher minimum wage whose benefits are not lost to higher rents and food prices, labor activists 14 say, would dramatically improve the lives of Cambodia’s garment workers.

劳工活动人士说，每天一顿免费餐和提高最低工资带来的好处不会被更高的租金和食物价格所抵消，这样就能极大地改善柬埔寨服装工人的生活。