Pandemic crushes global supply chains
In her lastweeksworking the freight shift at the local J.C. Penney store, Alexandra Orozco took out her phone and hit record. The 22-yearold shot a video of the giant black-and-red ‘Everything Must go!’ posters, andposted it on TikTok in October.
“Slowing losing my job,” shewrote below, days before the store in Delano, California, shut for good, one of 156 J.C. Penneys across the United States to close since June of this year.
Since being laid off, she’s applied for a couple of roles — counselling kids, delivering flowers - but has yet to hear back.
“It’s so sad,” she explains over the phone. “And it’s hard to find jobs here.”
Halfway across the world, Matefo Litali experienced upheaval, too. A skilled sewer, the 53-yearold worked at Tzicc Clothing, apparel-maker for U.Sbased giants J.C. Penney and Walmart, in Lesotho, a small mountainous country surrounded by SouthAfrica. She wasemployedfortwomonths before nationwide lockdown measures forced all garment factories to temporarily close inMarch. After two days back atwork, Tzicc confirmed her last day was May 7.
“I felt powerless,” she says. “The first thing that went throughmy mind was, ‘Why me?’ ”
Neither woman has met. Nor are they likely to: one lives in a remote agricultural town on the west coast of America, the other 10,000 milesawayinSouthernAfrica. Now, both of their lives - and livelihoods - are linked by a global pandemic that has crushed one of the world’s supply chains and with it, economies, too. COVID-19 lockdowns have obliterated a retail sector already struggling to survive before the coronavirus hit, which has in turn contributed to the collapse of the global garment trade and wreaked havoc for millions of workers, the vast majoritywomen likeOrozco and Litali.
Over the past two decades Lesotho’s garment industry, where 9 out of 10 workers are women, has boomed to become its largest employer, crafting clothes for Levis Strauss, Wrangler and Walmart. While Lesotho is a lesser-known garment powerhouse compared to China or Bangladesh, it’s another exampleofaneconomy heavily reliant on U.S. demand. Outside of the African continent, America is the largest recipient of Lesotho’s exports — accounting for almost half— accordingtothemostrecently availableWorldTrade Organization data from 2017.
In the U. S, meanwhile, clothing retailers have been hit particularly hard. The country is one of theworld’s top importers of clothing, accounting for nearly a quarter of global retail spend. While J.C. Penney hasn’t been profitable since 2010, the 118-year- old chain filed for bankruptcy in May. Six monthslater, itwasboughtout but itsworkforcewas slashed byover10,000duringrestructuring, a source familiar with the situation confirmed to The Fuller Project.” . J.Crew, Neiman Marcus and Brooks Brothers also filed for bankruptcy this year.
“AndwhenabigU.Sretailer takes a tumble,” says Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail, “the effects are felt across the globe.”
In March, as U.S. retailers cancelled or failed to pay for existing orders worth billions of dollars, the effects quickly rippleddownthe supply chain.
At Tzicc Clothing, roughly one fifth of employees have lost their jobs sinceMay, says Tsepang Makakole of Lesotho’s National Clothing and TextileWorkers Union. “For women, it’s a disaster...The industry is facing a total collapse.”
Litali feltweak in the knees when she heard that she was suddenly unemployed. A widowfor the last eight years, the seamstress single-handedly supports her youngest daughter, who is 20, and her 4-year-old grandchild. During the lockdown, her employer delayedherfinal$94paycheck for three months until May.
TheHumanResourcesmanager at Tzicc Clothing, Masefatsa Mofolo, confirmed the company laid off staff due to limited orders.
Formonths, Litali received noincomeorsupport, instead surviving off donated food from the local church until her final salary arrived. “I got so stressed I thought I was going mad,” she says. “I would spend the whole day sleeping.”
Back in California, Orozco occasionally walks past the town’s J.C. Penney. The windows are free fromsale signs, the gates locked. “I was close to the cleaning lady who worked there,” she says. “It brokemyhearttoknowIprobablywon’teverseeheragain.”