Chinese authorities confined the 600,000 people living around the factory that manufactures the majority of iPhones in the world for a week on Wednesday, after the flight of employees worried by the discovery of an outbreak of COVID-19.
The measure comes as China, the last major economy to enforce a strict health policy, faces a spike in COVID cases in its territory as winter approaches.
The economic zone around Zhengzhou airport (center), where the factory of the Taiwanese group Foxconn is located, is confined for seven days, according to a press release from the local authorities.
The factory, which employs more than 200,000 people, has been affected since mid-October by positive cases of COVID-19.
The site is located some 600 km southwest of Beijing. It “continues to operate in a closed circuit,” Foxconn told AFP on Wednesday.
According to analysts, the industrial complex, which has three factories, assembles around 80% of the iPhone 14, the latest model from the American giant Apple.
To depend less on China, the latter announced in September that it would outsource part of its production to India, where around 3% of iPhones were manufactured in 2021.
Contacted by AFP, Apple did not react immediately.
“Chaotic”
Footage on social media showed employees, who usually live on the site year-round, fleeing the Zhengzhou plant, some jumping over a fence.
On videos shot Tuesday and entrusted to AFP by a witness, a crowd of employees walk along a road to return home, dragging suitcases.
“People who tested positive coexist with negative people,” a 30-year-old employee told AFP on condition of anonymity, describing the management of the crisis as “chaotic”.
“Those who have a fever are not even sure if they will receive medicine,” he added.
This employee chose to stay on site “in (his) accommodation” made available by Foxconn, but “without going to work”.
On the other hand, “I am not going home because I am afraid of bringing the virus back” to my family.
Until November 9, the 600,000 inhabitants of the district “must not leave their homes” unless there is an imperative reason, local authorities have indicated.
Only “essential businesses” will be able to continue to operate, the others having to introduce telework.
The local daily Dahe Daily assured that the authorities would “completely disinfect” the Foxconn site, including the dormitories of the employees.
They can only leave after seven consecutive days of negative tests.
China’s zero-COVID policy, in effect for nearly three years, has resulted in repeated lockdowns, large-scale PCR testing and mandatory quarantine upon arrival from abroad.
Cases on the rise
To retain its employees, Foxconn announced Tuesday to quadruple the daily bonus for attendance at work, or 400 yuan (about 74 Canadian dollars).
Staff will receive an additional bonus of up to 15,000 yuan (approximately C$2,800) for attendance throughout November.
Foxconn admitted to facing a “long battle” with COVID.
But the firm did not specify the number of employees who tested positive or were confined to its Zhengzhou site.
A factory official told the weekly China Newsweek that the situation was “controllable”.
The number of positive cases in China is on the rise, with Wednesday more than 2,000 new positive cases announced for the third day in a row.
The number of people in quarantine in the country is now at its highest since the containment of Shanghai in the spring, notes the firm Capital Economics, with outbreaks detected in more than 50 cities.
To the south, the semi-autonomous territory of Macau announced on Tuesday a general screening of its 680,000 inhabitants after the discovery of a handful of cases.
In Canton (south), partial confinements had been decreed on Monday in several districts.
At the other end of the country, outbreaks have been detected in towns in the northeast, near the border with Russia and North Korea.