Despite a significant drop in the export growth rate of readymade garments (RMG), Alliance yesterday expressed satisfaction over the implementation of a corrective safety plan for RMG factories.Alliance is on track to complete nearly all Corrective Action Plans (CAPs)—except for newly added and expanding factories—and to transfer safety monitoring operations to competent local partners in 2018, said Jim Moriarty, the executive director of Alliance.Moriarty, also a former US ambassador to Bangladesh, was addressing a press conference on the release of the annual report on the progress made in factory safety aspects in the past four years.The Bangladesh RMG sector faced severe challenges and an image crisis due to the Rana Palza incident in 2013. Buyers in the USA and the European Union mounted pressure on the government and RMG factory owners to install safety measure and ensure compliance.Under the circumstances, Accord and Alliance teams came to Bangladesh to work on the safety norms of garments factories.The government and the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Associations, however, were not quite enthusiastic about the arrival of the two bodies because of the investigations and monitoring they were due to conduct and the pressure they exerted.The collapse of Rana Plaza, a five-storey commercial building, on April 24, 2013, in Savar is the biggest accident in Bangladesh’s RMG sector. The search for the dead ended on May 13, 2013, with a death toll of 1,134. Moreover, around 2,000 workers have lost their lives so far due to incidents of fire in various factories. Some of the major such incidents in RMG units include the death of 51 workers in a fire at Garib and Garib, Matrix Sweater, and Ha-Meem Group in 2010; death of 65 workers at the Chittagong KTS composite textile mills in 2006; death of 20 workers at Narayangonj Sun Knitting in 2005; death of 48 workers at a garments factory in Narshingdi in 2004; death of 53 workers at Narshingdi Chowdhury Knitwear in 2000; death of 22 workers at Mirpur Rahman & Rahman Apparels in 1997; death of 27 workers at Mirpur Tamanna Garments in 1997 and death of 27 workers at Mirpur Sareka Garments in 1990.Accord and Alliance have completed four years in Bangladesh. The RMG sector’s fire safety measures are said to have improved considerably.“Overhauling safety in hundreds of factories is a massive undertaking. We’re incredibly proud of what the Alliance has accomplished, together with our partners, in just four short years,” said Jim Moriarty.“Until we achieve our mandate, fortifying safety in Alliance factories and equipping workers with empowerment tools will remain in our focus,” he added.Alliance has designed a safety training workshop for senior factory managers and partnered with the Bangladesh University of Engineering and Technology (BUET) on a graduate-level short course for Bangladesh engineers—both designed to build in-country capacity on safety.“Our factories are demonstrably safer today than when Alliance began work. The hard work that factory owners have undertaken since 2013 is now paying off, with hundreds of factories reaching CAP closure,” said Moriarty.“This achievement represents a starting line for factories for whom maintaining rigorous safety standards must remain an ongoing priority. We’re committed to transitioning our programme to pave the way for sustainable progress beyond 2018,” he added.Moriarty said that in 2013, they inherited an industry that was all too familiar with tragedy and in which safety was an exception rather than the rule. “Four years later, our factories are demonstrably safer. I’d like to share our accomplishments till date as we enter our fifth year,” he added.As of today, 234 Alliance factories have completed their Corrective Action Plans or CAPs. And across all factories, 85 per cent of the required remediation items have been completed.Besides. 80 per cent of the highest priority repairs, such as the installation of fire doors and the removal of collapsible gates, are now complete, Moriarty said, adding, “As a result, almost all of our affiliated factories will complete their CAPs in 2018.”The exceptions will be newly added factories and those undergoing expansion, which require fresh inspection.Alliance’s worker empowerment programmes, which are the first and the only of their kind in Bangladesh, continue to expand and reach more workers, said Moriarty.“We have trained 1.4 million workers in basic fire safety, 90 per cent of whom have received our refresher training. We have also trained nearly 27,000 security guards in fire safety leadership,” he added.Moreover, Alliance’s well-publicised 24-hour Helpline, Amader Kotha, continues to allow workers to anonymously report concerns. At present, more than 1.3 million workers have been trained on, and have access to, the helpline.Alliance has established democratically elected workers’ safety committees in 171 factories. These committees are said to be a huge step forward because they give workers a seat at the table in monitoring safety issues within their workplaces.Finally, in order to further build local capacity, Alliance has piloted a first-of-its-kind safety training workshop for senior factory managers. It has also partnered with BUET on a graduate-level short course on safety for Bangladesh engineers.“Alliance factories will be significantly safer than they were in 2013. Therefore, keeping them safe in future will require a different strategy,” Moriarty said.Factories that have achieved a baseline of safety under Alliance must continue to maintain such standards, he stressed.“We are in conversation with the ILO, BGMEA, the Bangladesh government and other stakeholders so that a credible independent effort to monitor factory safety remains in place even after Alliance is gone,” he said.The Alliance has learned a great deal about creating a successful factory safety ecosystem over these past four years, Moriarty said, adding, “We’ll transfer this knowledge to the government and local partners so that these tremendous gains can be sustained and carried forward by the people of Bangladesh.”In reply to a question, Moriarty said prices of RMG products would increase in the US market after the end of the crisis period Bangladesh is currently experiencing.
