Many fashion brands have been making efforts to purge their supply chains of cotton picked in the Uyghur region  or any element that might have been made using Uyghur forced labor. In an attempt to fight back, the BBC reports China has launched an investigation into the U.S. company that owns Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein claiming they are using “discriminatory measures” against them.  

Beijing’s tit-for-tat tactics 

PVH is the company that owns the two fashion brands Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein. Both major U.S. fashion brands have a huge presence in China. The issue began in 2020 when a report was published by the Australian Strategic Policy Institute. The report alleges dozens of firms, Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger among them, were benefiting from Uyghur forced labor. Uyghurs who had been detained in camps were being hired out and forced to work.  

According to the report: 

“Chinese factories outside Xinjiang are sourcing Uyghur workers under a revived, exploitative government-led labor transfer scheme. Some factories appear to be using Uyghur workers sent directly from ‘re-education camps’.” 

Many Western governments, including the U.S., have recently passed legislation restricting or banning products from the Uyghur region. This is aims to stop goods made using Uyghur forced labor entering U.S. markets. And it seems now Beijing is hitting back, sending a message directly to multinational corporations. If you comply with consumer boycotts or government bans on products from this region, you may face retaliation. And the thinly veiled threat is that the investigation could lead to the brands being added to Beijing’s “unreliable entities” list. And that could hurt the brand’s bottom line. This comes on the heels of U.S. plans to add specific Chinese electric vehicle (EV) technology to its list of banned imports. 

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