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9 May, 2012
A two-day strike by ICEM Indonesian affiliate KSP2KI at one of the world’s largest paper mills this week produced sizeable salary increases for over 13,000 workers. With strike support from nearly all workers at Asia Pulp and Paper’s (APP) PT Pindo Deli’s twin mills in Karawang, West Java, the union achieved substantially more than the minimum government-mandated increase that APP was at first willing to distribute.
The two-year accord becomes retroactive to 1 April and grants workers, in some cases, a doubling of that provincial government minimum. KSP2KI, or Federasi Serikat Pekerja Pulp Dan Kertas, the Pulp and Paper Union of Indonesia, announced a three-day strike on 7 May but by yesterday, management had resumed talks and agreed to across-the-board increases.
Last month, managers of the 900,000-metric-tonnes-per-year paperboard, writing papers and tissue mills had unilaterally decided on the minimum increase while still in bargaining. The strike and yesterday’s bargaining lifted the wage increase from 9.14% to 18% for most workers, with increases to 14.14% and 11.14% in other job classifications.
That translates to an average IDR (Indonesia Rupiah) monthly increase of 139,363 (US$15.12). The minimum monthly pay at PT Pindo Deli in Karawang had been IDR 1,450,000 (US$157), so the pay grid for most workers will climb to above US$180-per-month.
The ICEM commends the KSP2KI – a union with 7,650 members at the twin Karawang mills – for the well-organised strike action and subsequent result, and encourages all workers at Karawang, including workers of outsource companies operating inside the mills, to take up union membership.
APP is part of Indonesian Sinar Mas Group and operates some ten paper machines and 14 paper-coating machines in the Karawang No. 1 and No. 2 mills in West Java. It also operates wholly-owned or majority-controlled pulp and paper mills – some nine in total – in other parts of Indonesia.