The
Rana Plaza fire has resulted in a worldwide response from companies who use
Bangladeshi ready-made garment (RMG) factories to sew products. In fact, the
crisis sparked a major global dialogue about the immediate need to reconsider
the safety regulations in the RMG factories, especially in Bangladesh, which
produces the second largest amount of RMG to textile companies in the world. The
Bangladeshi RMG industry is dominated by about 2 million
women working in illegally made buildings resting on soft and unstable
ground, like the Rana Plaza. BBC news reports that many companies using
Bangladeshi factories to supply their RMG stock are pressured to
reevaluate the measures needed in factory and worker safety. The
Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh was made just three days
ago, on May 13, 2013, which includes measures for all signatories to be more
thorough in regulating Bangladeshi factory safety, especially from fires:
“The agreement expands to five years
(from two) a fire and building safety program to be led by a multi-stakeholder
task force for the purposes of establishing an in-factory training program;
facilitating the creation of factory health and safety committees; reviewing
existing building regulations and enforcement; developing a worker complaint
process and mechanism for workers to report health and safety risks; and
advising a lead Safety Inspector.”
The
fire and the Accord both contribute to the growing pressure put on large
companies that use Bangladeshi RMG services. Large European companies like H&M,
which uses the most Bangladeshi RMG of any company in the world, and the
American entity PVH
(which owns Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger), are two major corporations that
have already signed the Accord. US’ Gap is currently unhappy with binding terms
and is pursuing separate initiatives to ensure worker safety. Wal-mart
immediately fired its Canadian-based jeans supplier, Fame Jeans, when pictures
of unauthorized production of jeans with the Fame Jeans label were pictured in
the Rana Plaza rubble. The NY Times writes that Wal-Mart was involved in
another fire incident last year at the Tarzeen
Fashions factory outside of Dhaka, which had barred windows that prevented
workers from escaping: “the parallels to New York’s Triangle Shirtwaist Factory
fire, in 1911, where doors were locked and a hundred and forty-six workers died
in the space of twenty minutes, are obvious.”
The
parallels between the Shirtwaist Factory fire in 1911 and the more recent
Bangladeshi factories both signify the problems surrounding industrialization
and the demands of a free market society. As the US’ role in global trade has
grown and supplying factories have relocated to the developing world, it seems
that the search for cheap labor and demands of western markets result in the
negligence of worker’s interests. And do these crises such as the Rana Plaza
fire really change anything other than the immediate concern of safety
regulations? Although it is great that companies will be more involved in
preventing future fire crises in Bangladesh RMG factories, will companies
actually invest in safety provisions or is this an empty promise? The natural
response to the crisis reflects only how companies act once under pressure of a
worldwide scandal, but under normal circumstances do companies actually care
about the well being of its workers? I think that it is important to find
companies who are invested in the safety of their workers, but safety
regulations will not end the ultimate problems of the textile industry:
economic powerhouses like European and American companies going to cheap labor
for inexpensive producing. The problems of today's society come more with the immoral standards of powerful executives who know that the garment industry is easy to take advantage of. Elizabeth Cline, the author of Overdressed: The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion,"explains how the globalization of the garment industry made it possible for us to buy cheap fashion but often with a hidden price tag for human rights and the environment." NPR Fresh Air- Ethical Fashion: Is The Tragedy In Bangladesh A Final Straw?
Just
because companies move toward signing and taking part in safety provisions does
not mean the products are ethically made. The workers are still crammed into a
building, have little wages (more
than 80% living on less than $2 per day), and minimal or no welfare or
benefits. A safety and fire accord is a great start, but I hope that this is
not the end in transforming sweatshops into ethical working places.
I
had a deep conversation with my mom the other day about the standards of shoppers
in today’s world. She told me that they seem less concerned with ethical
production and more concerned with styles and price. She owns a Target card, a
Costco card, and a Macy’s card. When she shops at Target, Costco, or Macy’s,
she notices that her tendency is to find the best deal around. When it comes to
clothing, especially, she doesn’t even bother looking at the place it was made
and is more preoccupied with the style and cost. However, even if she did check
the country of origin, it says little about its type of ethical production.
Between Malaysia and the United States, I would assume that the shirt homemade
in America would be more ethically made. However, NY
and LA’s garment industry still uses sweatshops in which many violate minimum
wages and practice poor treatment of workers (98% of LA factories have
workplace and health and safety problems that could possibly lead to death or
serious injury). Thus, I think it is important to reconsider the assumption we
make that the United States is a paradigm in the factory world, and that
developing countries are the only ones riddled with sweatshops. With this in
mind, there needs to be a system to help shoppers find ethically made sources
for their products. Especially to help shoppers identify ethically produced
clothing, a type of ranking from 1-20 (that already exists) or certification by
the FDA should be federally required on clothing products available at large
department stores like Nordstrom and Macy’s and convenience stores like Target,
Costco and Wal-Mart. Hopefully the
transition continues and the world’s RMG factories are efficient but respect
the workers as first class citizens, too.
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