The core term of the recent labor policies of the Lee Jae-myung government is 'industrial safety.' The SPC Group, which President Lee Jae-myung visited last month, is a place where industrial accident deaths have occurred consecutively. Regarding the human accident related to construction company POSCO E&C, President Lee made a strong statement, saying, 'Consider canceling the construction license.'
As the situation has turned serious, food companies appear to be responding proactively. According to the industry on the 8th, SPC Group has decided to limit night shifts for production workers to within 8 hours starting in October and to completely reorganize the production line operations. Samyang Foods has also decided to abolish special extended work at regional factories in Miryang, Wonju, and Iksan and plans to improve the 2-shift 2-crew system.
Other food companies are also reviewing their work systems. The 2-shift 2-crew system has been commonly applied. The CJ Foodville Eumseong factory also operated in a 2-shift 2-crew system during peak seasons, and other food companies have been conducting business in this system when circumstances required 24-hour operation.
Recently, hiring announcement phrases are also changing. A production facility of an A food company recently revised its hiring announcement posted on employment sites, including the term 'temporary' before the 2-shift 2-crew work. This was due to concerns that designating it as a 2-shift 2-crew system might portray the company as a 'bad corporation' under this government.
A representative from the food company said, 'While a 2-shift 2-crew system doesn't necessarily lead to accidents, we modified the wording considering the recent atmosphere,' adding, 'If we continue the 2-shift 2-crew system and an accident occurs, it would be a significant issue, and we were concerned about being stigmatized as a bad corporation.' He continued, 'However, we cannot eliminate the 2-shift 2-crew system right away, so we included this wording after much deliberation.' This implies that it was the best choice to prevent problems if the 2-shift 2-crew system were to be implemented.
In the production field, there are concerns about labor supply. Revamping the work system would require hiring more workers, but the fact that production factories are usually located in rural areas makes this difficult. This is also the reason why most food production companies conduct constant recruitment.
A representative from a food company noted, 'We are constantly recruiting because we currently do not have enough manpower,' stating, 'If we revamp the work system and do not have enough workers, we will have to reduce factory operations.' This means that changes in the work system could lead to a decrease in factory operating rates and a drop in revenue.
Moreover, this situation primarily involves large food corporations. Small food manufacturers can only take an 'onlooker' stance toward such changes due to the challenging realities they face.
A representative from a food factory in Busan stated, 'For places like fish cake factories or cod factories, which are greatly affected by the season, it is realistically difficult to operate without a 2-shift 2-crew system,' adding, 'If night shift pay decreases, even well-performing foreign workers will say, 'It doesn't pay off' and go elsewhere.'
A representative from a food factory in Gyeonggi Province pointed out, 'We cannot even apply the four major social insurances to our constantly employed workers. It is difficult to change the working conditions immediately,' adding, 'With a shortage of male workers, if salaries decrease, they will not come to work, and if large corporations change their working conditions while maintaining wages, smaller factories like ours will inevitably face more severe recruitment difficulties.'
As President Lee shows interest in industrial safety, changes are happening swiftly. On one side, the hiring announcement phrases are changing, and on the other side, significant changes are being monitored for their impacts.
It remains to be seen whether the new government's policies will lead to significant changes and whether such changes will occur not only in large corporations but also in small and medium enterprises.