Almost half of the remediation works in factories under the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety have been completed, the North American retailers’ platform said in a report yesterday.“Progress remedying factory safety issues is significant but remains slower than projected,” the Alliance said in the report.Factors such as political unrest, a lack of qualified engineers, and time-consuming yet required imports of safety equipment have delayed remediation.As of now, 24 factories have fully completed their remediation works, according to the report.Formed in the aftermath of the Rana Plaza collapse in 2013 with the view to improving workplace safety, the Alliance will function in Bangladesh up to June 2018.By then, the platform aims to markedly improve workplace safety in the 677 factories from which its 26 members source.“All Alliance factories require some form of remediation to fully meet our safety standards.”Due to the progress in remediation, the incidence of serious fires in garment factories has dropped significantly since 2012.The number of fires in garment factories plummeted about 90 percent between 2012 and 2015, according to data from the Bangladesh Fire Service and Civil Defence.In 2012, there were 250 garment factory fires in Bangladesh, which is an average of five fires per week, taking the lives of 115 people.In contrast, last year, there were just 30 such fires, none of which resulted in death.Another reason for the slow progress in remediation works is the fresh need to amend the Alliance’s protocols to address the realities on the ground when new challenges arise, the report said.For instance, initially there was no need to take approval from the Alliance for the hydrant and sprinkler design.However, during remediation verification visits, the Alliance engineers came to learn that many systems were not being designed or installed correctly.For example, a fire occurred on February 23, 2016 in the Pretty Sweaters Ltd factory, which had just entered the Alliance process, but had previously done some remediation work.The factory had improperly installed a poorly designed sprinkler system before coming online with the Alliance.Fortunately, the fire doors and hydrants had been remediated properly and were able to contain the fire long enough to allow the fire service to arrive, the report said.This case reinforces our requirement that factories get design approval from our team before beginning physical remediation,” the Alliance said.Meanwhile, the agency’s engineers have recommended closure of 36 factories to the review panel, which consists of representatives of the Alliance, government officials, rights groups and garment makers’ associations.Of these, one has been relocated to a new structure and 13 are actively undergoing repair; the remaining 22 have either been permanently closed or suspended by the Alliance.The association has also started cutting ties with factories that are not making adequate progress on remediation. To date, it has suspended 77 factories — and their status is publicly reported, the report said.The Alliance has set up a helpline for the workers in 643 factories where 866,702 workers are employed. So far, 55,544 calls have been received by the helpline.It has also trained 1.2 million workers and re-trained 420,000 on fire safety and 20,000 security guards on evacuation training.“There is still much to do to meet our five-year goals, but we’ve come a long way toward improving workplace safety in factories,” the Alliance said. “We will continue to work with our partners during the next two-and-a-half years to ensure that safe workplaces in the Bangladesh ready-made garment industry become the rule, not the exception.”
