Friday juli 31. The last day for 282 workers of the cokesfactory Sluiskil, Netherlands. The factory could no longer resist the competition
from Asia. Chinese cokes are in the market for $65,-- per ton. In Sluiskil they pay above that price for cole, the raw material for cokes. The factory in Sluiskil, Zeeuws-Vlaanderen, Netherlands, mainly delivers to steelworks in France and Belgium. At the blast-funish works in IJmuiden now is the last cokesfactory in the Netherlands. But that factory produces only for the consumption of its own steelwork.
The 282 workers are sacked from 01/01/2000.
About thirty workers are on early retirement - 55 jaar. About one hundred workers found already another job. The remaining are starting from januari 1 on unemployement benefit. Photographer Piet den Blanken was present on the last labour day. He followed the workers in their last walk to the dress- and bathrooms.
The last day people said good bye drinking a lot of consumptions. The cokeskins don not burn any longer. The first rips are in the wall of the kins make them forever useless.
Here you can go to Den Blanken's homepage from where you have access to his other picture-series: Cuba as it is, Prostitution, Illegal in Istanbul, The Kid-Soldier, Manhunters, the Ceuta Tragedy and more.