A dress is not worth a life.: Corgqnized crime and migrants exploitation in Prato

Traduzione di Elena Ciullo

What often lies behind the excellence of “Made in Italy” is exploitation. In Prato, the heart of the Tuscan textile district, organized crime has built a system that intertwines illegal employment, inhumane conditions and irregular migration. This situation allows contracting companies to maintain the “Made in Italy” label while exploiting low-cost labor: it is localized offshoring, a hidden face of the fashion industry that must be exposed.

According to the report “Chinese Organized Crime in Italy. Characteristics and evolutionary lines” by the CNEL Socio-Economic Observatory on Crime, between 2004 and 2010, 28,464 Chinese citizens were reported for immigration violations. Of these, 5,329 were reported for aiding and abetting illegal immigration, followed by exploitation of prostitution (1,896), intentional personal injury (1,357), trademark counterfeiting (1,069), theft (920), and criminal association under Article 416 of the Criminal Code. As reported in the document, the largest concentration is in the capital, Rome. However, it is Prato that is causing the most concern, as criminal leaders have established close ties with influential members of the local community.

Chinese organized crime has a solid and efficient structure, which allows it to control the migration route from the beginning to the end. The migrant's journey from China usually involves the use of various means of transport along the way, and the migrant may use a Korean or Japanese passport or a tourist visa to enter Italian territory. There is a strong link between traffickers and entrepreneurs: they usually collaborate to ensure tighter control over migrants. Typically, the entrepreneur provides jobs in restaurants and workshops, where the migrant can pay off their travel debt by working until the debt is extinguished. The relationship between trafficker and entrepreneur is not formally structured, but rather based on trust and mutual benefit. Migrants are segregated and forced to work up to 18 hours a day, and once the debt is paid off, they are relatively free to look for another job.

One of the most profitable businesses is prostitution. Women are smuggled into the country at the organization's expense and, once they arrive, are subjected to sexual exploitation. Almost all of them have irregular status, which makes them more vulnerable to the organization's control. They are not usually kept in the same place for long and are moved every few weeks, thus increasing their isolation. Three types of activities are carried out: one aimed at wealthy members of the Chinese community, the second aimed at less affluent Chinese, and the third aimed at Italian clients.

Another financially profitable sector is manufacturing, which is typical of the city of Prato. In the 1980s, Prato began to attract migrants from foreign countries, such as China. As noted in a 2020 study by the University of Florence, in a decade, the Chinese community became the largest foreign ethnic group in Prato, growing from 518 inhabitants in 1990 to 43,545 in 2000. In 2018, there were 22,897 Chinese residents in Prato, accounting for 11.8% of the city's total population. However, these figures do not take into account the number of irregular immigrants who probably reside there, nor the number of Chinese who work in Prato but live outside the city limits. For example, according to an estimate by Irpet, reported by Il Tirreno in 2014, the number of irregular Chinese immigrants in Prato ranged between 5,000 and 8,000.

These migrants have become a key part of the workforce in Prato's textile industry for many reasons. Due to the industrial decline that hit Prato at the end of the last century, many abandoned factories became centers for Chinese subcontracting workshops. Furthermore, the first Chinese immigrants to Prato came from the Zhejiang region and the city of Wenzhou, known for their long-standing manufacturing and textile traditions. This background was a perfect fit for the area's long history in manufacturing, and the immigrants' specializations were needed by the locals. The economic crisis of the 1980s had led to a trend of offshoring production abroad to reduce labor costs, but Chinese businesses in Prato became a substitute for offshoring, offering much cheaper labor. The Chinese presence contributed significantly to the competitiveness of Prato's textile sector, despite the damage suffered by workers.

Certain characteristics typical of Chinese workshops have been identified. Chinese-run subcontracting workshops in Prato are essential to the local textile sector and focus mainly on garment assembly and knitwear production. The businesses are usually family-run and small in size, but they frequently collaborate with different clients, including medium-sized companies and luxury brands. The dynamics between subcontractors and clients can vary from long-term collaborations to sudden contract terminations. The working environment is highly demanding, with employees often facing 15- to 20-hour shifts, seven days a week, while pay is usually low. These conditions particularly affect women, as highlighted by the fact that the practice of terminating pregnancies is significantly more widespread among Chinese women than among Italian women.

The Osservatorio Interventi Tratta (Trafficking Intervention Observatory) reports data that provides a picture of the situation in Prato. A press release from the DTL (Prato) in April 2016 revealed that out of 42 companies inspected, 38 had irregularities. Thirty-four orders to suspend activities were issued. Among the 231 workers inspected, 136 were found to be illegal and 18 irregular. A total of 19 criminal complaints were filed. Further inspections in 2017-2018 found several environmental violations, such as improper disposal of hazardous waste, lack of disposal permits, and illegal dumping of materials. In 2017, of the 1,364 criminal proceedings initiated for workplace safety violations, 83% involved Chinese entrepreneurs. A Chinese company in Montemurlo was found to have a system that differentiated wages based on the nationality of the workers. These findings reveal the presence of a hierarchical system of exploitation that particularly disadvantages African migrant workers. When a fire in a workshop in Viano killed two Chinese workers in 2017, investigations were launched. These led to the discovery of 15 beds inside the building, which was once an apartment. The business owners were Chinese, while the apartment owner was Italian.

Italian luxury never ceases to amaze international catwalk audiences, but too often it does so at the expense of exploited migrant workers. These networks of illegality, which involve the complicity of an entire system, must be urgently dismantled. It is not just a question of dignity in the workplace, but in too many cases of survival: the deaths in the factories of Prato remind us that behind the luxury of Made in Italy there are lives (and families) broken by exploitation. Always remembering that a dress is not worth a life.