Business as usual?
ONE year has passed since 1135 garment workers lost their lives and more than 2500 people were injured in the Rana Plaza industrial disaster -- only five months after a fire at Tazreen factory had killed 112 workers. These accidents sent shockwaves around the world. For years Bangladeshi trade unionists, together with their comrades in the international labour movement, had voiced their concerns about the safety risks in some factories of the readymade garment (RMG) sector. Yet, it took a manmade disaster like Rana Plaza to accelerate overdue efforts to ensure better working conditions in the country's RMG sector. Today both global and national stakeholders are taking responsibility for moving forward this push for workers' rights and safety.
A year after Rana Plaza, one of the most important tasks is to make sure that the Accord on Fire and Building Safety 2013 (“The Accord”) is fully implemented. The Accord is a legally binding agreement between international trade unions, Bangladeshi trade unions, and international brands and retailers. The International Labour Organisation (ILO) acts as the independent chair. The Accord provides for a central and equal role for workers and worker representatives, including direct trade union participation in factory training. For far too long the industry has relied on one-off safety audits in its factories, conducted by auditing companies created and funded by brands themselves. The Accord instead pushes for strong industrial relations and is the only international initiative with trade unions as equal partners, replacing flawed auditing models, and ensuring the conduct of regular safety inspections in a context where workers are empowered to refuse dangerous work.
The Accord is a crucial first step to ensure better working conditions for the RMG sector, and efforts should continue until the conditions and provisions of the Accord are met, and workplace safety and workers' rights in the factories satisfy international standards. There is no room for compromise when the health and safety of workers are at risk, even if improvements mean additional cost for brands and factory owners. Consumers are increasingly aware of where and how their clothes are produced. That is why the image of an industry that strives for profit at the price of risking workers lives is neither desirable nor profitable, especially in a highly mobile sector with brands threatening to move elsewhere if the image of Bangladesh's RMG industry worsens further.
The responsibility to protect workers in Bangladesh lies with the employers and with the government entrusted to implement and enforce labour laws, and bring the labour law in line with binding ILO conventions. So let us look beyond the Accord at what has and can be done by stakeholders in Bangladesh. Factory and building owners were the main culprits at Rana Plaza and Tazreen, but no less culpable are the international brands with their big orders and tight deadlines, which exploit lax safety standards and labour laws.
The most effective way to improve working conditions is to provide legal and political space for trade unions to organise workers and negotiate with factory owners as equal partners in a trustful social partnership. That is why I am happy that the government has begun to reform the labour law and that more than 120 trade unions have been registered over the last year. In a country where the labour force increases by 2.1 million per year and 87% of workers still have to make a living in the informal sector, it is in the interest of the government, workers, factory owners and brands to have a growing and prosperous RMG industry that provides much needed employment and contributes to the country's economic growth. However, this growth needs to be managed on the basis of respect for the workers. Otherwise there will be no sustainability, but most probably more accidents with unnecessary casualties. Bangladesh, a young and thriving industrial society, has enormous potential to improve its flourishing new industries. My appeal to the entrepreneurs of this dynamic country is simple: as you are working hard, your workers are working just as hard. So be fair -- share the responsibility, share the profit, and you will be able to share the pride for the quality of your results.
When I met with Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina during my recent visit to Dhaka in early April, I was encouraged to hear that the government was making further efforts to improve the working environment of RMG workers. The hiring of additional inspectors and the donations to Rana Plaza victims through a fund of the prime minister are crucial and welcome steps. The prime minister also told me that if the buyers would pay higher prices for RMG items, the government could more easily put pressure on garment factory owners to increase wages of workers. I agree with her. The international labour movement will stand together in putting pressure on international brands to make sure their profit margin is shared more fairly with the people making the clothes they sell around the world.
Ensuring that work places are safe and wage growth remains at a socially and economically sustainable level requires reliable cooperation and accountability structures between workers and employers; this is the basis of industrial relations. Recent incidents in garment factories where workers used their right and freedom of association, but were subsequently fired by the factory management are, however, worrying. I am glad that the Ministry of Labour and Employment is currently looking into these cases. The potential of the industry is limited without the cooperation between social partners from a unified trade union movement, the BGMEA/BKMEA and the government. A concerted effort by all actors requires the institutionalisation of more reliable channels and forums for dialogue at the national level, such as a tripartite mechanism between government, elected representatives of employers and workers for the RMG sector.
Historically, workers' rights were often born out of tragedies. The fire at the Triangle Waist Factory in the United States in 1911 is a case in point -- it brought about a series of improved safety measures to protect American workers. Workers' rights are not intended to be an ideological battleground. They are human rights, and as such a pillar of a just and equitable society. On the morning of April 24, 2013, the workers of the five garment factories in Rana Plaza had no choice but to enter a building deemed unsafe by inspectors the day before, due to intimidation, and threats of job loss and withheld pay. There was no trade union to speak on their behalf, as none of the workers at Rana Plaza was a trade union member. These workers have become victims of one of the worst industrial disasters in world history. It was manmade and preventable. Over the last 100 years, from the Triangle Waist Factory in New York City in 1911 to Rana Plaza in Savar in 2013, time and again profit has come first, and people second. We know better, so let us do better.
The writer is President of the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), which represents 176 million workers in 161 countries. He is also Chairman of the German Confederation of Trade Unions (DGB). He visited Bangladesh in early April.
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