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The three remaining garment manufacturers on Saipan will shut down operations by February 2009, Saipan Tribune learned yesterday.
Uno Moda Corp. Garment Factory, US CNMI Development Corp. and Marianas Garment Manufacturing have already informed Labor Secretary Gil M. San Nicolas about their intention to close their factories.
Uno Moda Corp. is closing down on January 31 while U.S. CNMI Development Corp. and MGM are officially shutting down on February 7, Saipan Tribune reports.
Uno Moda Corp. general manager Won Gun Bak recently notified San Nicolas that their factory is closing down on January 31, but that they had already informed their workers on November 29, 2008, about the management's decision.
Uno Moda has a total of 228 alien workers and 55 resident workers, for a total of 283 employees.
Bak said airline tickets for the workers' repatriation will be provided while those workers who want to transfer to other employers will be given assistance for the processing of documents.
"It is very difficult to continue our operations since our buyers moved to another place and our orders ceased and it affected our productions," said Bak in his letter to San Nicolas.
US CNMI Development Corp. general manager William Fong and MGM deputy general manager Zeng Gengzin said the factories ceased active garment manufacturing last December 8, but they are officially closing on February 7.
In their separate but similar letters to San Nicolas, Fong and Gengzin said the corporations will continue to exist and that it is anticipated that they will keep their import and export licences active.
All their workers, they said, were already given written notices about the closure.
In 2008, eight garment factories, including the big United International Corp., shut down operations, affecting over a thousand nonresident and resident workers.
The CNMI used to have 34 garment factories, all located on Saipan, contributing some US$60 million in direct taxes a year to the local government.
Many of those factories reportedly started ceasing operations in January 2005 when the World Trade Organization lifted trade quotas.
