In July 2008 National Labor Committee issued its report "Nightmare on Sesame Street", alleging abuses including child labour, excessive working hours & poor housing conditions at Hoida (Kai Da)* factory in Shenzhen, China.  The factory produces Sesame Street ‘Ernie’ toys for K’NEX. 

Full report: "Nightmare on Sesame Street - Ernie Toy Made in Chinese Sweatshop", National Labor Committee, July 2008

Factory profile: "Profile of a 'Model Chinese Factory' - A Relatively Better Factory - But it is still a hard life, with long hours, low wages and primitive living conditions", National Labor Committee, 15 July 2008

The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre invited Hoida, K'NEX and Hasbro (reported as also sourcing from the factory) to respond.  

• Hoida factory response [PDF] (in English and Chinese)
   
• K'NEX response [DOC]
   

Natl. Labor Committee update: "Sesame Street and K’NEX Investigating Sweatshop in China", 16 July 2008

Hasbro response, 4 Aug 2008: "Hasbro does not distribute the Sesame Street product that was a part of the NLC report. We do distribute some traditional K’Nex products in three European markets, the UK, Holland and Belgium. The information also mentioned on the NLC site about Hasbro’s ownership of K’Nex was not at all up to date. Currently Hasbro owns 4.5% of the parent company of K’Nex. We did point these items out to the NLC and we understand that they did make the corrections on their website." [See NLC website: "Hasbro Denies Relationship with Sesame Street Toys", 14 July 2008]

*Hoida - English translation from Cantonese pronunciation.  Kai Da - English translation from Mandarin pronunciation.