Apple is rated eco-unfriendly in China

Apparently Apple has got a pretty bad reputation over in the land of the Great Wall. According to reports online, Apple is under fire from some Chinese environmental groups for ignoring Chinese concerns about health and safety problems in their factories. A report written by 36 environmental groups has placed Apple at the bottom of the list for being environmental friendly in a study conducted on 24 tech companies that have factories in China. Why did Apple make the list? Well apparently one of the factories that manufacture screens for the iPhone and iPad, Wintek, uses poisonous chemicals in the production of the displays.

These chemicals have caused several workers to be hospitalized with nerve damage. Although the workers have since recovered and returned to work and the chemical isn’t being used anymore, Apple has refused to take the blame for the incident by declining to confirm that Wintek is a supplier for their screens. What gives? It’s one thing to neglect responsibility over an incident, but to deny a fact that is pretty well known just gives the company a bad image. One of the environmentalists even told Bloomberg in an interview, “We originally thought that Apple, as a corporate citizen, would take a leadership role, but now we feel they ended up as the most obstructive.” What do you think of Apple’s negligence of their factory’s working conditions and to the environment?