Owners' final proposal Tk 4,680

The garment owners are set to propose a minimum wage of Tk 4,680 per month, their final salary offer, for the workers at today's meeting of the wage board.
The figure, although an improvement over the owners' original proposal of Tk 3,600, falls way short of the workers' demand of
Tk 8,114.
The amount provides Tk 3,900 as basic salary, house rent and medical allowance, Tk 520 as food allowance and
Tk 260 as transport allowance, said a source in the wage board.
“I am still firm on my previous position of
Tk 8,114 as minimum wage. But, there is a room for further negotiation,” Sirajul Islam Rony, workers' representative on the wage board, said yesterday.
Regardless, the new wage structure would be locked in today's meeting as it will be the final one of the six-member wage board, he added.
It would then be forwarded to the ministry of labour and employment and is likely to be implemented from next month. “We will propose the salary in such a way that workers at the top grades are also equally benefited,” Arshad Jamal Dipu, owners' representative on the wage board, said.
Atiqul Islam, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, the garment makers' platform, said the competitiveness of the country's RMG sector has been considered when finalising the wage structure.
“We are not in good position in terms of competitiveness with India, Vietnam and Cambodia. We need a win-win wage structure so that everybody is benefited from the hike,” he added.