To increase
earnings and continue acquiring companies around the globe, the expansion
policy of InBev, the largest beer company in the world, includes
restructures that are always based on the closing of factories and massive
layoffs of workers. This reality is currently affecting Belgium and other
countries of Europe. SIREL spoke about this with Bart, leader of CCSA-CSC,
Belgium’s largest trade union.
-How many workers and how
many plants does InBev have in Belgium?
-Right now it has four
breweries, plus the distribution centers. It employs a total of 3,000
workers.
-What’s behind this
restructure that announces nearly 500 layoffs in Belgium and about as many
more in four other European countries?
-We believe InBev wants to
economize in everything, cutting costs, in order to have more money to buy
breweries in other parts of the world, like, for example in China. By
maximizing efficiency they want to earn a certain target figure in two
years, and to achieve that, the financial equation must be optimum.
Last year they announced a
restructure that affected 50 workers -basically personnel employed in
computer services- and another involving 235 workers, with the closing of a
local and very traditional brewery in Hoegaarden that manufactures a very
popular white beer. To these it added the closing of another plant in
Brussels. Some weeks ago InBev announced a new restructure, which primarily
concerns Liege, laying-off 150 administrative employees and 50 other workers
from the computer department, who are going to be outsourced.
Apparently there are two more
restructure plans in the region, but management does not want to disclose
any details, to avoid a greater impact in Europe and among Belgian workers.
-Unions find out about the
company’s plans through the media, like the rest of the population. -How do
you interpret this methodology?
-We think it’s a strategy
deployed by management, which doesn’t want to communicate a clear plan, but
rather prefers to implement it gradually, one plant at a time, first with
the factory workers and then with the employees, in each country separately,
because they understand that in that way they can weaken unions.
-I understand that the unions
have conducted economic studies and drafted alternative plans in response to
these layoff announcements from InBev. What do they consist of exactly?
|
While three former InBev directors that left
their positions last year received 31 million euros -some 37
million dollars- the transnational corporation presses on with
its restructure and cost-cutting plans, which will affect the
jobs of hundreds of workers and will result in the closing of
several plants. |
-This week we are going to
propose alternatives. We think that the Hoegaarden brewery should not be
closed down, but the company has said no. In the next few hours we’ll get
together with all the workers to analyze our next steps; we’ll evaluate the
possibility of calling a strike to try to keep the Hoegaarden brewery open
or, if that fails, of negotiating a welfare plan for the people that are
laid off, a plan that is socially acceptable, which will grant them
compensations and social security benefits. Those are the two paths that are
open right now.
-You’re planning an important
demonstration for late March.
-Yes, on March 28 we’re
holding a large demonstration in Louvain to protest against InBev, a company
that in spite of having earned a billion euros in 2005, is firing a great
number of people. With the march we want to send out a clearer message to
society about the long-term plans management has, and also disseminate our
intention of reaching a collective bargaining agreement for all of Europe,
which the company refuses to accept. The strategy of management is to
prevent unions from joining forces and creating blocs in Europe and in other
continents, that is why they are carrying out these restructures gradually,
one place at a time.
-Is there a good
communication between the different European InBev unions?
-It’s not easy because we all
speak different languages. Today the European regional office of IUF is who
communicates the problems, and it is coordinating and trying to implement a
common strategy.
-How does Belgian society
react to this state of affairs?
-The company has bad press.
The general public doesn’t understand how a company like InBev, with the
history it has and the earning it obtains, can fire people like that. Last
Friday the 10th, the media announced that three former managers
of InBev -among them the company’s CEO John Brock- received 31 million euros
from InBev -approximately 37 million dollars- when they stepped down last
year. But at the same time they’re firing workers to cut down costs and
obtain greater earnings that will enable them to purchase factories in other
countries.
-Have you identified any
actions to be carried out internationally?
-It’s very important to have
a good communication among InBev workers throughout the world, like we tried
to achieve last year with the conference in Sao Paulo, Brazil. It is vital
that workers be aware of what’s happening in other countries to be able to
form a bloc against InBev management.
Rel-UITA
March 14, 2006
* In charge
of Research Services of the Christian Food and Services Association (CCAS-CSC).
In charge of international relations and collective bargaining agreements in
the domestic food sector.
