One hundred and seventy-one readymade garment factories which are on the suppliers’ list of Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh have made zero progress on factory remediation suggested by the platform of major European brands and retailers. After the approval of respective corrective action plans of the units by Accord, the factories got from three months to one and a half years, but no one is yet to start remediation process at their units. Of the 171 factories, most of them were inspected by Accord more than one and a half years ago, according to BGMEA sources. On February 11, Accord provided the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association with a list of 553 factories in which the remediation progress was below 40 per cent. According to the BGMEA, the progress on remediation in 211 factories was 0-10 per cent, in 85 factories 11-20 per cent, in 103 factories 21-30 per cent and 154 factories made 30-40 per cent progress. Of the 553 factories, 522 are the members of the BGMEA. The BGMEA is going to start a series of meeting with the factories from today (Wednesday) to know the reasons for the slow progress on remediation work at their factories. The meeting will also find a solution to expediting the remediation work in the factories. ‘Tomorrow we will sit with 80 factories in which remediation progress is 0-10 per cent. Firstly we will want to know the status of remediation and whether the factory authorities agree on the Accord report,’ BGMEA vice-president Mahmud Hassan Babu told New Age on Tuesday. He also said that the BGMEA wanted to learn from the factory owners what kind of support they expected from the trade body for completing remediation work. Some factory owners, who have made 0-10 per cent progress on remediation, said that they received letters from the BGMEA for a meeting on Wednesday at the office of the trade body. In the letter, the BGMEA asked to know from the members whether they agreed on the remediation progress report provided by Accord. If so, owners at the meeting would have to explain the reasons for the slow progress on remediation, the sources said. n the meeting, the factory authorities would have to inform the BGMEA whether they have any plan to relocate their factories or not, the BGMEA leader said. In the progress status provided by Accord showed that in some factories corrective action plan was being implemented but some timeframes were not met. Some factories did not agree to implement the corrective action plan and as a result Accord signatories terminated business with nine factories following a notice and warning process. Earlier, Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, a consortium of North American buyers, had provided a list of 36 factories to the BGMEA stating that the remediation in the units was not satisfactory. After the Rana Plaza building collapse in April 2013 that killed more than 1,100 people, mostly garment workers, EU retailers formed Accord while North American retailers formed Alliance. Both the initiatives launched inspection programmes in the Bangladeshi RMG factories from where their members procure products and the initiatives completed their primary safety assessments in their listed factories. The government in association with the ILO launched a separate inspection programme for rest of the garment factories which are not on the lists of Alliance and Accord. The three initiatives so far inspected 3,660 factories of which Accord inspected more than 1,600 factories.
