Posted on 30-3-2002

Globalising Tokoroa
by Alan Marston

The foreign owned conglomerate Carter Holt Harvey announced Wednesday night
it would cut 400 jobs at the Kinleith pulp and paper mill in the South
Waikato town of Tokoroa. This came as an out of right field blow to the
town and to the country, but really we should not be so surprised, laying
of large numbers of workers in order to increase shareholder returns and
capital repatriation is integral to the process now called globalisation.
Still the sides have not changed their arguments.

5% return is not enough for Carter Holt Harvey and the solution is simple
and terribly familiar, contract out most maintenance and stores jobs and
cut production staff.

Tokoroa Mayor Gordon Blake said the district was still trying to recover
from past job-cuts which had caused at least eight shops to close. Now, he
is agonising over even deeper cuts to the mill's workforce - from 772 to
369. The expected hiring of about 190 workers by a maintenance contractor
will reduce the net job loss to just over 200, and the company is trying to
soften the blow by ruling out any short-term closure of the mill.

Who can believe CHH, it cannot believe even its own promises having
identified itself totally with the international commerce and investment
market. And so the usual suspects are paraded and apportioned all blame.
"We want to grow the mill, not see it waste away," said the company's
Kinleith head, Brice Landman. Carter Holt Harvey chief executive Chris
Liddell said the company was on a "treadmill" of trying to cut costs to
meet ever-increasing international competition, but the company wanted
Kinleith to survive to help to add value to the expected surge of timber
from maturing forests.

The union representatives have spoken against industrial action, which they
recognise won't help. But what will help the workers they represent? A
question yet to be answered by any union, political party or government
department. Surely an even deeper question has to be asked, is the global
economy worth it and if not how can we start buying our way out.