 The factory where the incident took place is the <unk> ( " Early Light " ) Toy Factory ( <unk> ) , owned by Hong Kong @-@ based Early Light International ( Holdings ) Ltd . , the largest toy manufacturer in the world . The company 's Shaoguan factory in the <unk> district employs some 16 @,@ 000 workers . At the behest of the Guangdong authorities , it hired 800 workers from Kashgar , in Xinjiang as part of an ethnic program which relocated 200 @,@ 000 young Uyghurs since the start of 2008 . According to The Guardian , most workers sign a <unk> to three @-@ year contract then travel to factory dormitories in the south ; in addition to their salaries ranging from 1 @,@ 000 yuan to 1 @,@ 400 yuan a month , many get free board and lodging . Most of these <unk> are away from home to work for the first time . The Far Eastern Economic Review said Guangdong authorities initiated a controversial plan to ship [ Uyghur ] workers to Guangdong factories amid continuing labour shortages . The young workers , whose families have charged that they were forced to send their children south , often lack even basic Chinese language skills and find it difficult to fit in with the dominant Han culture . " The New York Times quoted Xinjiang Daily saying in May that 70 percent of the young Uyghurs had " signed up for employment voluntarily . " However , Kashgar residents say the families of those who refuse to go are threatened with fines of up to six months ' worth of a <unk> 's income . 
