Employment shifts and the role of labour outsourcing in Chile's forest-based cluster

摘要

Chile's forest-based cluster has seen dynamic growth during the last decades, stimulated principally by significant state subsidies and an export orientation mainly of commodities. Major changes are induced by technological innovation, expansion and labour outsourcing in reaction to a growing global competition. The paper assesses the employment shifts and the role of outsourcing of labour in Chile's wood and paper industries in a time series analysis of the official annual national manufacturing survey (ENIA) for the period 1998-2008. The results provide evidence for a complete structural shift of employment in Chile's forest-based sector based to a great extent on outsourcing of labour mainly in medium and large enterprises, most notable in sawmilling, wood-based panel and paper production industries. The sharp growth of indirectly employed workers in this sector can be related to business strategies aimed at increasing international market competitiveness, which however have proved to be detrimental to social inclusion and improvement of labour condition. A strong decline in foreign direct investment and economies of scale in enlarged, technologically more advanced enterprises, which however invested barely in research and development (R&D), triggered the shift towards outsourcing during the last decade. Chile's inefficient labour protection legislation, coupled with weak governmental law enforcement and control of the labour conditions, permitted to substantially lower labour costs associatedwith subcontracted low skilled work.