Sagar Biswas :
A recent study report of USA-based New York University’s Stern Center for Business and Human Rights has said that millions of people working in the readymade garment industry of Bangladesh still face unsafe conditions.
The report, released on Thursday, also said that Bangladesh has more factories engaged in the global RMG business than stated by its industry.
The findings of US organisation came at a time when Accord and Alliance’s safety inspections have reportedly indicated that most of the RMG factories in Bangladesh are maintaining ‘stringent’ safety standards laid down by the Western retailers’ bodies.
“I don’t think the study findings are correct. All of our factories have already been inspected by Accord and Alliance. They are not telling anything about our factories. We have shut down 36 factories which were found risky during the inspection,” President of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association [BGMEA], Siddiqur Rahman, told The New Nation on Saturday night reacting sharp over the study.
“I also do not agree with the finding that there were 7,000 factories in
Bangladesh producing for the global market……Subcontracting factories don’t exist here,” he said.
The BGMEA Chief also ruled out running of non-compliant factories and said, “The foreign buyers don’t place orders in non-compliant factories.”
According to the report, Bangladesh’s US$25 billion garment industry has been suffering from safety problems since the 2013 collapse of a complex, the Rana Plaza, in which more than 1,100 people were killed.
Thousands of factories have been undergoing inspections and dozens closed over safety concerns. But at many functioning factories, employees fall outside the purview of those improvements, the report said.
It said, more than 7,000 factories in Bangladesh are producing goods for the global fashion business, nearly double the 3,600 exporting factories that the BGMEA operates. Many of those are small- and medium-sized factories, the workers of which, indirectly produce goods for foreign brands through larger factories, the study also found.
Sarah Labowitz, Co-Director of the Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, in a statement, said: “Though global brands assert they have strict policies against subcontracting, in reality, millions of workers and thousands of smaller factories are producing their goods. Working in these factories is often highly risky.”
The discrepancies, the study underlined were largely because the depth of subcontracting was profound, with many registered factories relying on labour and goods from informal factories which make up about half of all factories in the country.
The US study documented 7,179 factories, and those previously uncounted factories are largely informal and unregulated, meaning they’re the ones that tend to be the most dangerous.
Often, they’re set up as subcontractors-a brand will place an order with a direct supplier, and for various reasons the supplier may subcontract the work to another factory, an indirect subcontractor.
“The result is that millions of workers in subcontracting factories fall outside the protection of international safety-improvement initiatives, and are especially vulnerable in a country where unsafe working conditions are a chronic problem,” the Stern Center said in a press release.
Many of these factories are producing clothes for international brands. Technically, only about 3,200 are listed as direct exporters, meaning they’re registered to directly supply international labels.
In the survey of 479 factories the team conducted in June, it found that 153 were acting as subcontractors “producing at least partly for the export market. ‘It’s routine for this kind of subcontracting to occur in brand supply chain,” the Centre said.
“It is very unfortunate to reveal such a misleading study by the US organization when Bangladesh is going towards prosperity and development day by day. The entire world is praising us [Bangladesh] for achieving such a status in RMG sector,” Atiqul Islam, former President of BGMEA, said yesterday.
“I don’t know the basis of the study. I urge them [Stern Center] to produce their basis of study before us,” he said.
A recent study report of USA-based New York University’s Stern Center for Business and Human Rights has said that millions of people working in the readymade garment industry of Bangladesh still face unsafe conditions.
The report, released on Thursday, also said that Bangladesh has more factories engaged in the global RMG business than stated by its industry.
The findings of US organisation came at a time when Accord and Alliance’s safety inspections have reportedly indicated that most of the RMG factories in Bangladesh are maintaining ‘stringent’ safety standards laid down by the Western retailers’ bodies.
“I don’t think the study findings are correct. All of our factories have already been inspected by Accord and Alliance. They are not telling anything about our factories. We have shut down 36 factories which were found risky during the inspection,” President of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association [BGMEA], Siddiqur Rahman, told The New Nation on Saturday night reacting sharp over the study.
“I also do not agree with the finding that there were 7,000 factories in
Bangladesh producing for the global market……Subcontracting factories don’t exist here,” he said.
The BGMEA Chief also ruled out running of non-compliant factories and said, “The foreign buyers don’t place orders in non-compliant factories.”
According to the report, Bangladesh’s US$25 billion garment industry has been suffering from safety problems since the 2013 collapse of a complex, the Rana Plaza, in which more than 1,100 people were killed.
Thousands of factories have been undergoing inspections and dozens closed over safety concerns. But at many functioning factories, employees fall outside the purview of those improvements, the report said.
It said, more than 7,000 factories in Bangladesh are producing goods for the global fashion business, nearly double the 3,600 exporting factories that the BGMEA operates. Many of those are small- and medium-sized factories, the workers of which, indirectly produce goods for foreign brands through larger factories, the study also found.
Sarah Labowitz, Co-Director of the Stern Center for Business and Human Rights, in a statement, said: “Though global brands assert they have strict policies against subcontracting, in reality, millions of workers and thousands of smaller factories are producing their goods. Working in these factories is often highly risky.”
The discrepancies, the study underlined were largely because the depth of subcontracting was profound, with many registered factories relying on labour and goods from informal factories which make up about half of all factories in the country.
The US study documented 7,179 factories, and those previously uncounted factories are largely informal and unregulated, meaning they’re the ones that tend to be the most dangerous.
Often, they’re set up as subcontractors-a brand will place an order with a direct supplier, and for various reasons the supplier may subcontract the work to another factory, an indirect subcontractor.
“The result is that millions of workers in subcontracting factories fall outside the protection of international safety-improvement initiatives, and are especially vulnerable in a country where unsafe working conditions are a chronic problem,” the Stern Center said in a press release.
Many of these factories are producing clothes for international brands. Technically, only about 3,200 are listed as direct exporters, meaning they’re registered to directly supply international labels.
In the survey of 479 factories the team conducted in June, it found that 153 were acting as subcontractors “producing at least partly for the export market. ‘It’s routine for this kind of subcontracting to occur in brand supply chain,” the Centre said.
“It is very unfortunate to reveal such a misleading study by the US organization when Bangladesh is going towards prosperity and development day by day. The entire world is praising us [Bangladesh] for achieving such a status in RMG sector,” Atiqul Islam, former President of BGMEA, said yesterday.
“I don’t know the basis of the study. I urge them [Stern Center] to produce their basis of study before us,” he said.
