iPhone maker Foxconn is raising wages in a scramble to lure back workers fleeing its prison-like COVID restrictions: reports

• Major iPhone maker Foxconn is raising wages in a scramble to get fleeing workers to return.
• Foxconn's plant has been mired in COVID restrictions since an outbreak on its premises.

Apple's biggest iPhone maker, Foxconn, is raising workers' wages at its plant in Zhengzhou, China, after some of its employees began fleeing the site to escape stringent pandemic measures following an outbreak, according to several media reports.

Foxconn, which employs around 200,000 workers at the plant, bumped hourly pay by as much as 36% to around $5.20 an hour for "key positions," Bloomberg wrote on Monday. The outlet cited sources who declined to be identified because the pay raise was not publicly announced.

Meanwhile, Foxconn said it would raise daily bonuses for its workers at the Zhengzhou plant to $55 a day for the month of November, Reuters reported.

Before the recent pay bump, Foxconn workers made around $1,082 per month, the South China Morning Post reported in January.

Reports of Foxconn raising wages comes amid a critical period, as Apple looks to produce newly-launched iPhone 14s for the holiday season. Foxconn produces around 70% of Apple's global iPhone shipments, per Reuters.

Reuters reported on Monday that the pandemic measures mean that iPhone production could drop by as much as 30%.

Its factory in Zhengzhou went into a closed-loop system in mid-October after coronavirus cases emerged there — a response which adheres to China's strict zero-COVID policy. Under the closed-loop system, workers are transported from their dormitories to the factory and back, and are not allowed to leave the premises.

A risk of food shortages became a source of unrest, as workers on production lines were given meal boxes, but other workers were only given basic foods like bread or instant noodles, Bloomberg reported on October 28.

Frustrated with their new living conditions, some workers were filmed climbing fences at the Zhengzhou plant and trekking to their hometowns miles away. One 20-year-old worker said she and her brother walked 25 miles with their luggage to get home, Bloomberg reported.

Foxconn previously told Insider that it was "aware that under the current situation, it is a protracted battle for safeguarding the health and safety of more than 200,000 employees in Foxconn's Zhengzhou park."

The iPhone maker further said it was arranging transport for employees who wanted to return home, after videos of its workers walking home went viral on Chinese social media.

Foxconn and Apple did not immediately respond to Insider's requests for comment for this story.