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Source: The Green Voice of Freedom (GVF)
April 13, 2010
A conservative Iranian newspaper has reported that one of the Middle East’s biggest soft drink producers has closed down its plant after it fired its workers.
In a report ridiculing the government’s management of the industry, the conservative Jomhourieslami (Islamic Republic) newspaper has reported that the soft drink company Khorram Noush located in the war-torn city of Khorramshahr has shut down its plant after it fired its workers.
According to Jomhourieslami, the plant had been revived with government funding during the city’s reconstruction years after the long Iran-Iraq war. However, wrong policies have resulted in the company’s heavy debts to Iranian banks such as Saderat and Bank Melli.
The report adds that the company’s new managing director had been receiving bonuses of more than $100,000 and even received various company benefits while on leave.
Despite being located near a potential market in Iraq’s Basra province the soft drink producer has lost an important foreign market to other Arab competitors in the Persian Gulf region such as Saudi Arabia and Kuwait, while Jomhourieslami adds that soft drinks companies from Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates are currently dominating the market in Iran’s southern cities.
What is interesting about the firing of the Khorram Noush workers is that two of the sacked employees were plant technicians who had recently been sent to Germany in order to receive training for operating on newly bought machines in the production line. One of the two, who is an old-timer at the plant is currently working as a taxi driver in order to make ends meet.
The recent report comes as many fear that the growing dissatisfaction amongst workers in Iran will lead to more widespread protests which have the potential to gain momentum in the near future. Recently, former reformist President Mohammad Khatami warned of “social crises” if the current situation were to continue in the country.
[...] Unemployment fears as important plant shuts down [...]