In recent months, Italian authorities have been cracking down on workshops where employees work in appalling and dangerous conditions to produce luxury goods for high-end fashion houses. The companies that commission these goods, the latest being Loro Piana, are now being forced by the Italian courts to take more effective action against such practices.
In recent months, there has been a wave of crackdowns on Made in Italy.
And they are tarnishing the reputation of prestigious French and Italian luxury brands that have, more or less consciously, encouraged practices known as “caporalato,” a form of extreme labor exploitation akin to slavery.
Since this spring, several cases have been reported in the media.
Valentino Bags, Armani, and Dior in the spotlight
On May 15, Valentino Bags Lab, a subsidiary of the famous fashion house of the same name that manufactures its bags, was placed under judicial administration for one year by the Milan court.
The court accused the company of failing to adequately monitor its subcontractors. An investigation revealed that several of them were exploiting their employees, some of whom were Chinese nationals without legal status. Forced to sleep on site, they enabled the workshops to operate 24 hours a day, working well beyond the legal limit, without breaks and in violation of safety rules: in order to avoid slowing down their pace, machine safety devices were sometimes disabled!
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Read also > Armani convicted for misleading consumers about its manufacturing practices in Italy. – Luxus Plus
Featured photos: © Loro Piana
