During last month’s Hong Kong Toy and Games Fair, the Southeast Asia
Toy Association (SEATA) hosted its Annual Summit. The event brought together
experts from key emerging manufacturing countries in the region including Vietnam, Indonesia, India, Malaysia and the Philippines.
SEATA was created three years ago by a group of leading toy brands
and retailers including Mattel and LEGO.
Asia Pacific is the world's most rapidly developing market for toy sales,
and Southeast Asia plays a crucial role in its growth. Southeast Asia's population is
over 625 million and set to grow to 717 million by 2030. In addition, their
economies are growing fast, With aggregated GDP growth of 4.7% per annum.
At the event, established factories in Vietnam and Indonesia shared insights on the benefits their companies have seen after
expanding in the region and diversifying their base. For Vietnamese
manufacturing this including the logistical benefits of the close proximity to
Mainland China and a reduced language barrier as Most Vietnamese people learn
Mandarin at school. Benefits of Indonesian manufacturing included a large
supply of workers and lower labor costs.
Our President and CEO, Carmel Giblin also presented at the SEATA
event sharing insights on some of the top 5 most common social compliance risk
areas we encounter in our work to raise standards at toy factories in Southeast
Asia. These include a lack of Personal Protective Equipment , insufficient
emergency evacuation processes, wages & compensation not meeting legal
requirements, issues around clear emergency exits, and challenges around
llegally required benefits not being provided.
Southeast Asia is a region of
opportunity for toy manufacturing, countries such as Indonesia and Vietnam typically have a high volume of workers with the necessary skills
to support toy manufacturing. Labor costs can also be lower than other toy
manufacturing regions, and benefit from our dedicated Support in the region.
After China, Indonesia and Vietnam are the countries where the Ethical Toy Program has the most
Certified factories and so we are increasing the level of support we are
offering to toy factories based in these countries.
Last year, Ethical Toy Program opened an office in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam and hired a new team member in our South
East Asia team dedicated to increasing our
on-the-ground support to Vietnamese factories and supporting delivery of our
Progress Visits which complement Our audit program by providing increased
capability building training and support for our factories. We are also
developing more resources in Vietnamese such special guidance for our Audit
Checklist which will soon be available in Vietnamese.
This article is originally published on ICTI
https://www.ethicaltoyprogram.org/en/opportunities-for-toy-manufacturing-in-southeast-asia/