Who moved my factory?

IT was an audacious move that has divided public opinion in Italy and brought into focus the country’s low productivity and high-labour-cost crisis. Last month, the owner of an electrical components factory waved his employees off on their summer holidays. Then, without informing them, he moved the entire operation to Poland.

Fabrizio Pedroni said his factory, near Modena, had not turned a profit for five years and he was being strangled by high salaries, crippling taxes and dismal productivity. Moving to Eastern Europe was the only way to save his company.

When his 40 employees found out what had happened, they were furious. They were not due to return from holiday until this week, but got wind of the covert operation in midAugust and turned up at the Firem factory in the town of Formigine to find it devoid of machinery.

They blocked the last of about 20 trucks from leaving the plant, but the rest were long gone, en route to Olawain in southwest Poland.

Pedroni said he had received death threats and would not be returning to Italy any time soon.

“If I had told the unions that I intended to transfer production to Poland, they would have had my property confiscated, just as they tried to block the trucks,” he told Italy’s Radio 24. “I had three options — close, move the factory, as many other businesses have done, or shoot myself in the head.” — © The Daily Telegraph, London