今年秋季，香港新翼鞋业(New Wing Footwear)的老板梁日昌(Frank Leung)飞到了一些自己以前做梦也想不到会去的地方。
梁日昌先后走访了孟加拉首都达卡和埃塞俄比亚首都亚的斯亚贝巴。他此行是为了物色新的生产基地。新翼鞋业是一家专门生产女鞋的公司，目前在中国南方的东莞设有一家工厂。然而，尽管跑了很远的地方，他还是失望而归。
迁移的压力显而易见。过去两三年，中国的劳动力成本以每年15%-20%的速度上涨，不断挤压企业的利润空间，而作为中国制造业发动机舱的广东省，也因此面临着考验。
迫于成本上涨和人民币升值，梁日昌不得不把东莞的人手从3年前的8000人精简到3000人。
梁日昌表示，孟加拉的工资水平大约是中国的20%-30%，工人每周工作48小时，相比之下，中国的法定劳动时间是40小时。在孟加拉投资还可享受10年的免税期。
然而，他的语气听起来非但没有兴高彩烈，反而显得忧心忡忡。“他们的交通拥堵得可怕，工厂里都在用发电机（因为电力供应不稳定），而物流更是导致生产效率低下。”
达卡之行数周后，他乘坐飞机前往亚的斯亚贝巴。那里的工资更低，但就是找不到配套产业，如鞋底厂和纸板厂。
“埃塞俄比亚的交通没那么拥堵，但那个地方太偏远。”去了一趟印度的钦奈之后，他被那里的极度贫困彻底打消了念头。他现在也拿不定主意，究意要不要把生产迁移到中国以外的地方。
广东制造商当前所处的环境，已促使许多厂商把生产迁移到南亚和东南亚国家。研究机构龙洲经讯(GaveKal Dragonomics)上周预测，明年中国的出口增长率将放缓至9%。扣除今年以来中国制造商转嫁给西方消费者的价格上涨因素，今年前三个季度中国的出口额仅增长12%。
许多工厂老板都曾考虑过迁移到越南之类的国家，但还是选择了留在东莞，原因就在于这里的供货商网络更加完善，工人的劳动效率也更高。一家手提袋公司的老板David Liu就是其中之一。
刘老板到华中地区的湖南去过好几趟，考察在当地办厂的可行性，最后也是因为距离配套产业太远和技工不好找而作罢。
他转而加倍努力去留住东莞工厂里那些比较年长的熟练工人，比如为已婚员工家庭提供独立宿舍，并为他们安装空调。通常情况下，工人们都是六、七个人住一间宿舍。
刘老板表示，他的利润率从10%降到了3%，但他卖给欧洲零售商的时尚手提袋（售价为300-400欧元）每年都要提价8%。
刘老板的情况普遍存在，并非特例。7-8月期间，中国出口欧盟商品的单价平均上涨了10%。根据龙洲经讯的数据，这个涨幅略高于土耳其，但远低于墨西哥（17%）和印度（23%）。
尽管如此，中国政府的一项计划将促使许多工厂萌生去意：即在未来几年内，逐年提高最低工资标准，以推动工人的薪资翻倍。
一些公司选择既保留中国的生产基地，同时又到海外扩张。香港上市公司天虹纺织(Texhong Textile)财务总监许子慧(Charles Hui)表示，该公司从2007年起到今年为止，分三阶段在越南开设了数家纱线厂，在那里增添了2000个人手。越南的工资水平相当于每月1200元人民币，而中国是2000元人民币。而且越南工厂的自动化程度更高，需要的工人数量也就更少。
天虹纺织目前在越南雇有4000名工人，在中国有1万名。该公司四分之三以上的产品在中国销售，这是该公司保留中国工厂的原因之一。
此外，许子慧表示，中国老板一般都不愿意把公司搬到异国他乡，因为“他们不熟悉要怎么管理不同文化背景的工人”。
龙洲经讯发现，今年以来，即使是在纺织、服装和玩具这些劳动密集型行业，中国制造商也还是能够把产品提价10%-20%，尽管这些行业不时传出有工厂要搬到东南亚的新闻。“这表明他们获得了一定的定价能力。”
瑞士信贷(Credit Suisse)经济学家陶冬表示，原因很简单。“没有哪个发展中国家能够比得上中国的一半效率。”
中国拥有数量庞大的劳动人口，与其他发展中国家相比具备更高的劳动生产率，港口道路设施也优越得多，这些因素导致企业很难找到可以代替中国的地方。陶冬表示：“当中国不再具备这些优势时，也不会出现第二个中国。”
Zhou Ping补充报道
译者/何黎
http://www.ftchinese.com/story/001041671
Frank Leung, the owner of a women’s shoemaker based in Hong Kong, has flown to places he never imagined he would visit this autumn.
The owner of New Wing Footwear has been to Dhaka and Addis Ababa, looking for other production bases as well as his factory in Dongguan in southern China. However, despite searching far and wide, he has been disappointed.
The pressure to move is clear. Labour costs in China have risen 15-20 per cent annually over the past couple of years, squeezing margins and creating testing times for Guangdong, the engine room of Chinese manufacturing.
The higher costs – along with the rise in the renminbi – have forced Mr Leung to reduce headcount in Dongguan from 8,000 three years ago to 3,000 today.
Wages in Bangladesh, he reports, are about 20-30 per cent of those in China. People also work 48-hour weeks against the legislated norm of 40 hours in China. The government is offering a 10-year tax holiday.
But, instead of sounding ebullient, Mr Leung is shell-shocked. “They have crazy traffic congestion and everyone uses a generator in factories [because the power supply is erratic],” he says. “The logistics make it very hard to work efficiently.”
A couple of weeks after his trip to Dhaka, Mr Leung flew to Addis Ababa. Wages were even lower than those in Bangladesh but he could not find the supporting industries, such as manufacturers of shoe soles and cardboard.
“Ethiopia has less congestion but it is in the middle of nowhere,” he says. India’s oppressive poverty put him off altogether after a visit to Chennai. Now, Mr Leung is uncertain whether he will move production from China after all.
The climate for manufacturers in Guangdong has prompted many to move to countries in south and south-east Asia. Last week, Gavekal Dragonomics, a research firm, forecast that export growth in China would reduce to just 9 per cent next year. Deduct the price increases Chinese manufacturers have passed through to consumers in the west this year, and export volumes rose only 12 per cent in the first three quarters of this year.
Many factory owners, such as David Liu, whose company makes handbags, have looked at moving to countries such as Vietnam but elected to stay in Dongguan because supplier networks and worker productivity are better.
Mr Liu made trips to Hunan in central China to see if a factory there would be viable. Again, the distance from support industries and toolmakers scuppered the idea.
He has elected instead to work harder at retaining his older, skilled workers in Dongguan by, for example, providing married couples with their own private rooms and installing air-conditioners for them. The norm is for workers to live in dormitories of six to eight people.
Mr Liu says his profit margins have dropped from as high as 10 per cent to as low as 3 per cent, but he has passed on price increases of 8 per cent a year to retailers in Europe on stylish hand-bags, which sell for €300-€400.
Mr Liu is the rule, not the exception. The unit price of Chinese exports to the EU rose 10 per cent between January and August. This increase was marginally higher than Turkey’s but well below those of Mexico (17 per cent) and India (23 per cent), according to Gavekal.
Nonetheless, Beijing’s decision to double wages for factory workers by increasing the minimum wage every year over the next few years will encourage factories to migrate from China.
Some companies have opted to keep bases in China as well as expand abroad. Texhong Textile opened yarn factories in Vietnam in three stages between 2007 and this year, when it added another 2,000 jobs there, according to Charles Hui, finance chief of the Hong Kong-listed company. Wages in Vietnam are the equivalent of Rmb1,200 a month compared with Rmb2,000 in China. And the Vietnamese factories are more highly automated and require fewer workers.
Texhong now employs 4,000 workers in Vietnam as well as 10,000 in China. More than three-quarters of the company’s production is sold to China, one reason it keeps factories there.
In addition, says Mr Hui, Chinese-owned companies are typically reluctant to relocate because they are “not familiar with managing workers who do not have the same culture”.
Gavekal found that even in industries as labour intensive as textiles, garments and toys, where the headlines suggest factories are fleeing to south-east Asia, China’s manufacturers have raised prices by 10-20 per cent this year, “indicating they have gained some pricing power”.
Dong Tao, an economist with Credit Suisse, says the reason is simple: “There is no developing country that can match half the efficiency China offers”.
China’s combination of a huge workforce with higher productivity and far superior ports and roads compared with other developing countries makes it hard to find any options. “When China grows out of this,” says Mr Tao, “there will not be another China”.
Additional reporting by Zhou Ping
没有评论:
发表评论