In recent days there have been numerous media reports and speculationregarding my personal philanthropy and relationship with the University ofOregon. As a lifelong Duck and in fairness to the many alums at Nike andaround Oregon, I feel obligated to address this personally.
I was shocked on Friday morning, April 14 at 9 a.m. to find out that theUniversity of Oregon had joined the Workers Rights Consortium (WRC). Withthis move the University inserted itself into the new global economy whereI make my living. And inserted itself on the wrong side, fumbling ateachable moment.
Nike did not invent the global economy but has been determined to be aleader and to show its good citizenship. We are very, very serious aboutproviding good factory working conditions and continuously improving thework experience for all 500,000 people who make Nike products. We also havebeen consistent in calling for one strong external code and one monitoringsystem for the entire industry that puts us all on a level playing field.
We believe the President’s and the Department of Labor’s Fair LaborAssociation (FLA), representing a coalition of human, consumer and laborrights groups, industry and universities, is such a system although it istaking too long to get active.
Regardless of whether either the FLA or WRC get up and running, we arecommitted to having the best monitoring and remediation process possible,and to be open. Should anyone doubt that, today I have directed our laborpractices department to begin a program to publish the results of allPricewaterhouseCoopers factory monitoring visits on our website beginningin May – warts and all. We have nothing to hide.
Because this issue has been so important to students on college campusessuch as the University of Oregon, last fall we invited students to becomemonitors. Tomorrow we will be releasing the student monitors’ reports on 32of our college licensed apparel manufacturers.
Frankly, we are frustrated that factory monitoring is badly misconstrued.For us one of the great hurdles and real handicaps in the dialogue has beenthe complexity of the issue. For real progress to be made, all keyparticipants have to be at the table. That’s why the FLA has taken so longto get going. The WRC is supported by the AFL-CIO and its affiliatedapparel workers’ union, UNITE. Their main aim, logically andunderstandably, however misguided, is to bring apparel jobs back to theU.S. Among WRC rules, no company can participate in setting standards, ormonitoring. It has an unrealistic living wage provision. And its “gotcha”approach to monitoring doesn’t do what good monitoring should – measureconditions and make improvements.
As even our most severe critics acknowledge, Nike, because of the strengthof its trademark on campuses, not because of its actions in overseasfactories, has been the specific target of criticism. We have been called”evil” by some.
Let’s recap some of the things this “evil” company has done over the pastseveral years:

• Increased minimum age requirements for footwear workers to anindustry-high 18 years of age
• Increased wages for Indonesian footwear workers by more than 70 percent
• Established community-based micro-loan programs and on-site, afterhours continuing education for our footwear factory workers
• Significantly improved indoor air quality in our footwear factoriesconsistent with OSHA guidelines
• Disclosed the U.S. and global locations of the 45 factories thatproduce collegiate licensed apparel

If you want to begin to understand this issue, ask University of OregonPresident Dave Frohnmayer one question: Ask him if he will sign a pledgethat all contractors and sub-contractors of the University of Oregon aswell as the University itself meet the WRC’s “living wage” provision. Notjust Nike. All of us. No university, including the University of Oregon,can meet the WRC living wage and other code standards for food serviceemployees, grounds keepers, clerical personnel or teaching assistants.
My history with the University of Oregon goes back a long way. My fathergraduated from the University in 1934. From the time I was14 years old itwas the only college for me. The late Bill Bowerman, my mentor andco-founder of Nike, was a graduate as well as track coach there for 24years. There is a strong emotional attachment for me with the University. Ipersonally have given $50 million to the University of Oregon – $30 millionfor academics, and $20 million for athletics.
Nike has a lot of pride and has been my life. It is the source of anydollars I am able to give. To accept the University of Oregon’s endorsementof the WRC would be to place my company, our employees, ouruniversity-related manufacturers and their employees in unknown hands underundefined monitoring that has no protocols, no credibility, no role for thecompanies whose businesses are being monitored, and no independence. Itwould be a sell out of my company, my fellow employees and the progress wehave worked so hard to make in our factories both here and abroad. I amsimply not able to do that.
Nike will honor its contractual commitment. But for me personally, therewill be no further donations of any kind to the University of Oregon. Atthis time, this is not a situation that can be resolved. The bonds oftrust, which allowed me to give at a high level, have been shredded.