Update | Apple supplier based in China accused of labour violations by US watchdogs

A Chinese electronics firm that supplies parts to Apple is being accused of repeated labour violations by two US-based watchdogs who investigated it twice in the past two years – exposing continued problems in Apple’s supply chain ahead of its much-anticipated iPhone 6 launch.

In a report released on Thursday night, China Labour Watch and Green America said they found a raft of malpractices that contravene Apple’s 2005 code of conduct for suppliers, Chinese law and the corporate social responsibility rules of the factory’s Taiwanese owner, Catcher Technology.

An “investigator” who posed as one of 20,000 workers at the factory in Suqian, Jiangsu province, found that workers had to do 100 hours of overtime a month – three times the legal limit of 36 hours – and that minors as young as 16 were forced to work the same hours as adults.

Its workshops, which had nearly round-the-clock operations, also did not have adequate ventilation, according to the report.

Employees were also sent to the floor without health or safety training and in some cases no protective equipment, leaving them exposed to toxic chemicals that irritated their skin and eyes. Supervisors would fraudulently sign certificates proving the employee had received training, even if it was non-existent.

CLW also noted with alarm how supervisors would leave fire exit doors and windows locked in a factory that is filled with flammable aluminium-magnesium alloy dust and scraps.