Prato'S Chinese Garment Factory Is Walking In The "Grey Area".

< p > Shen Jianhe (a) works < a href= "http://www.91se91.com/news/index_c.asp" > garment factory < /a > in Prato, Tuscany, Italy. When Italy police seized the garment factory, not only did she lose her job, she also lost her residence.

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< p > this garment factory was founded by the Chinese immigrants of platto, mainly producing cheap clothing for fast fashion companies in Italy and Europe. There are nearly 5000 garment factories in Prato.

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< p > Shen Jian ho is the mother of four children.

During the day, she was 38 years old, sewing trousers in the Chinese garment factory. In the evening, she slept in the plasterboard compartment behind a wooden wardrobe in the factory until the police arrived at the factory on a cold morning in December.

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P > the police seized the factory and confiscated 25 sewing machines.

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< p > in the pile of cloth, leftovers and dangling cables, Shen Jian's stuff is: a pink baby coat, a blue child stool and a laptop computer.

She stuffed them in a pickup truck and prepared to carry them away.

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< p > Shen Jianhe said with tears in his eyes, "what choice do I have?" < /p >

In the history of P, Prato is the center of Italy's clothing industry.

In less than 20 years, platto became the largest Chinese garment industry in Europe.

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< p > more than 50 thousand Chinese people live and work here to produce garments labeled "made in Italy".

Even if the clothes labeled with this label belong to the low-end products of fashion industry, they are still different from those made in China.

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< p > to a certain extent, Prato's Chinese community was very successful, and many Italy enterprises failed to survive.

Italy's economy has barely increased in the past ten years and has just recovered from the recession, partly because many small manufacturers are unable to compete on the global stage.

However, Prato is still the center of illegal activities.

Many people in Prato say that this is a by-product of globalization when it deviates from orbit.

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< p > according to the statistics of the local government, 2/3 of the Chinese people in Prato are illegal immigrants.

Aldo Milone, a security council member, said that about 90% of the Chinese factories in Prato were in violation of the law in various ways, and almost all of them were factories built by Chinese people who rent Italian houses.

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< p > these illegal activities include the use of cloth smuggled from China, tax evasion and complete violation of health and labour laws.

This month, a fire killed 7 workers asleep in the cardboard compartment of the workshop.

Prosecutors suspect that this is a fire caused by an electric stove.

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< p > Italy officials admit that they have failed to effectively combat increasing illegal activities.

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Mayor P Roberto Cenni took office in 2009 and promised to rectify the area.

Cenni said he has been stepping up inspections since he took office, but only a small number of factories are in the normal monitoring range.

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< p > he said: "we have no ability to resist this illegal system."

He said only two labor inspectors.

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In P cases, local officials are also to blame.

The attorney general Piero Tony has arrested 11 suspects this month, including a city hall employee who issued a false residence permit. The person has issued a false residence permit to more than 300 Chinese immigrants since May and each charge 600-1500 euros.

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< p > the overwhelming majority of Chinese people from Prato are from Wenzhou, Zhejiang.

They entered Prato in the middle of 1990s, worked in the Italian textile mill, and quickly grasped the whole production chain.

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Andrea Cavicchi, director of the Italy Employers Association (Confindustria), said that China's accession to the WTO in 2001 was a death knell for Prato's local handicraftsmen, because the trade barriers set up by the European Union for the protection of manufacturers were gradually being eliminated.

In order to fight against cheaper imported clothing, local enterprises producing high-quality clothing began to cut jobs. Chinese entrepreneurs began to rent Italian abandoned warehouses and set up their own factories.

Slowly, Prato's Chinese beat Italy's local businesses with speed, efficiency and productivity.

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Nowadays, these Chinese enterprises export millions of low-end garments to the entire European continent, and the price of a women's cotton shirt is less than 2 euro, and a coat sells for only 12 euro.

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< p > Cavicchi said: "in 2001-2011 years, Prato's Italy a href=" http://www.91se91.com/news/index_c.asp "> clothing industry < /a > reversed, and the labor force was reduced by half.

But the reality is, we can't blame the Chinese.

The problem is that our labor and energy costs mean that we are not competitive.

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< p > "speed is crucial.

In 3 days, they can produce thousands of garments, and the final result is perfect, of course.

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< p > outside the wall of Prato, Pi J Doyle (Via Pistoiese) has become a bustling "Chinatown".

The streets are full of Chinese restaurants, barber shops, schools, travel agencies, and young people practicing tai chi in the park.

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"The local people are tacitly informed, because the Chinese have brought a lot of wealth to help alleviate the impact of the global financial crisis on the region," Massimo Bressan, an immigration researcher at the p a href= "http://www.91se91.com/news/index_p.asp" > Prato /a Iris Institute, said.

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< p > when Cenni was appointed mayor of Prato, he promised to restore Prato's legal system.

In addition to increasing supervision over garment factories, the local government has also increased the cost of redemption of the confiscated machinery and issued a provision that warehouses should not be used before they meet the safety requirements.

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< p > but the problem is that 60% of Chinese factories only remain for two years, and then close to avoid inspections by tax authorities and reopen in other names.

City Councilor Milone said illegal immigrants discovered by the police were asked to leave Italy within five days, but there was no way to ensure that they really left.

He said, "this is a joke."

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< p > in addition, many illegal immigrants arrive in Italy through three month travel visas, but they will stay in Italy for many years until they earn enough money to return to China.

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