Labour Turnover (and Absenteeism) in Industrialising Developing Countries: Research on the Textile Industry in Ethiopia
Funded by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ), Berlin
Project Duration: 2020 - 2022 (3 years)
Project Abstract
The study Labour Turnover (and Absenteeism) in Industrialising Developing Countries: Research on the Textile Industry in Ethiopia carried out by the Institute of Sociology at the University of Giessen under the project lead of Prof Dr Reimer Gronemeyer aims to examine the phenomena of massive labour turnover and high absenteeism of labourers in the Ethiopian textile industry. The project duration is 2020 until 2022 and the undertaking is funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
The relatively young Ethiopian textile industry is supported by the German government with the special initiative Ausbildung und Beschäftigung (Training and Job Creation), however, has not yet turned out to be as effective as expected. High labour turnover, lacking reliability of labourers along with low productivity jeopardise the rentability, and by extension the success and existence of the newly raised industrial parks.
Managers, who are mostly expats, first and foremost see the problem in the »mindset« of the Ethiopian (female) workers. Most textile operators migrate to urban areas from rural settings and seem to encounter huge challenges adapting to industrialised work ethics.
The study sets a special interest in the perspectives, experiences, interests, and motivations of the labourers. The study follows an interdisciplinary research design. In addition to cultural, industrial- as well as development-sociological questions, it also considers questions from the perspectives of economics as well as industrial and organisational psychology.