World's leading retailer Wal-Mart saw two more trade unions established in its outlets in China over the weekend, making the total number hit four just a week after its first trade union was formed in southeast China's Fujian Province, Workers' Daily reported Monday.

Saturday night, 31 employees of Wal-Mart's Xinjiekou store in Nanjing, capital city of east China's Jiangsu Province, convened to announce the establishment of the third trade union in Wal-Mart's Chinese stores.

And 12 employees of Wal-Mart's Qianjinlu store in Shenzhen City, south China's Guangdong Province, elected their first trade union committee a few hours later in the wee hours of Sunday.

"The rapid development and promising future of the trade unions are heartening," Xu Deming, vice president of the All-China Federation of Trade Unions (ACFTU), was quoted as saying.

"We'll draw on their successful experiences to push forward the establishment of grassroots trade unions in enterprises including the transnational ones," Xu said.

Wal-Mart's 60 Chinese outlets employ 23,000 people. The first trade union was set up at Wal-Mart's Jinjiang outlet on July 29 after 30 employees appealed to the local federation of trade unions.

The second was set up last Friday at Wal-Mart's Hujing store in Shenzhen. It is reported that Wal-Mart was reluctant to have trade unions in its outlets.

With mounting pressure from the ACFTU and the public, however, Wal-Mart China has earlier said in a statement that "Should associates request the formation of a union, Wal-Mart China would respect their wishes and honor its obligation under China's trade union law."

Though a great deal of media hype surrounded the formation of its first trade union in Fujian, the event caused few ripples in the Chinese outlets of the retail giant.

With some 500 employees in Wal-Mart's Jinjiang store, only 30 of them become trade union members, and a majority of the rest do not even know a trade union has been established for their interests.

Wang Shaokai, an executive with the Jinjiang store, said both Wal-Mart headquarters and store knew nothing about the Jinjiang trade union prior to its setting up.

"We learnt it from media report," Wang said.

Ke Yunlong, newly-elected chairman of the trade union committee at the Jinjiang store, said, "We have yet had time to conduct detailed discussion on our work. But I believe the membership will increase with our endeavour."

According to China's trade unions law, enterprises or institutions with 25 employees and above should establish trade unions, and employees have the right to join the ACFTU.

(Xinhua News Agency August 7, 2006)