Three years after the Rana Plaza disaster that killed 1,135 factory workers with more than 2,500 others injured, small steps have been made towards improving governance in garment factories, ensuring rights and safety of workers and following the rules and regulations during construction of buildings in Bangladesh. Rana Plaza was an eight-storey building and it took 21 days to declare the search and rescue closed. Later, BGMEA declared that five garment factories were in operation in the Rana Plaza building at the time of the collapse where 3,900 workers (though BGMEA claimed 2,650) were employed. Rana Plaza collapse is the worst garment factory disaster ever, but there have been many other similar tragedies. On the list is the breaking out of a fire at Tazreen Fashions in January 2013 in which 112 people were killed. Just two months prior to the disaster at Tazreen, fires at two factories in Pakistan killed more than 260 people. After Rana Plaza collapse, a former chief engineer of the state-run capital development authority (RAJUK) said the owner had not received proper consent for the building, and that an extra three storeys were added to it illegally. The other reasons include conversion of the building from commercial use to industrial use where heavy machinery was placed on upper storeys and the use of substandard construction materials which lead to an overload of the building structure aggravated by vibrations due to the generators. All these reasons show the physical vulnerability of the buildings in Bangladesh. After Rana Plaza tragedy, the global fashion retailers have started to work together more closely to protect workers in developing nations and ensure the safety of buildings. But in addressing fire safety, building safety, workers’ protection, preparedness for massive collapse – there was not enough practical discussion, nor enough financing. Many of the workers are still reported to be missing, many victims are yet to receive the promised compensation from the government of Bangladesh and the western retailers. After a few days of the collapse, the owner of the Rana Plaza building was arrested and his assets also confiscated. Though he was charged with negligence, among other offences, many of his assistants have got bail by this time. After Rana Plaza collapse, the issue of minimum wage rate for garment workers has come to the fore. As a result of rounds of discussion, the minimum monthly wage for garment workers in Bangladesh has been increased to US$ 68, though it is very poor compared with about $ 280 in mainland China. Only a few of the factories have completed their structural assessment. “It is fair to say that the industry had not considered structural integrity of buildings as a risk,” Paul Lister, head of Primark’s ethical trading team, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation in a recent interview. On the other hand, the government has recognised the needs for labour unions in the factories as a result of which both the numbers of unions and the members have increased in last two years. After Rana Plaza collapse, vulnerability of the buildings in the cities is considered one of the major points of discussion. A single building collapse killed 1,135 people and wounded more than 2,500 workers the while government’s ‘all-out action’ took around 21 days for completing the search and rescue operation. Logically, the question arises — if a moderate tremor hits the country and collapses thousands of buildings, then how will the government do the search and rescue operation with this minimum level of preparation and acute shortage of equipment stocks? Thus, Rana Plaza collapse exposes the lack of preparedness of government and other relevant service providing agencies including factory owners for a tremor. Although Bangladesh has not experienced any major earthquake in over a century, the recent trend of jolts has brought the issue to the fore. As per CDMP research, a 6-magnitude earthquake will destroy 62,000 buildings in Dhaka. Thus Rana Plaza collapse gives us a wake-up call for enhancing our preparedness and implementation of building code. After Rana Plaza, the Government of Bangladesh has undertaken a number of initiatives to minimise the loss and damage caused by any possible disaster. Analysing the seismic data, the government has already prepared the earthquake risk maps of Dhaka, Chittagong and Sylhet city corporations and similar mapping projects are needed for some of the sub-regions. The National Contingency Plan has already been prepared. The Ministry of Housing and Public Works is working to enforce the Bangladesh National Building Code in constructing new structures to make them earthquake-resilient. However an authority for implementation of the Building Code is yet to be introduced. The government launched an initiative to develop 62,000 community volunteers across the country to carry out rescue operations immediately after any disaster. But the progress and the sustainability of the programme are not satisfactory. The compensation for Rana Plaza victims should be completed. It is urgent to give the injured victims new jobs, address their health issue in a sustainable way so that they can live a graceful life. The education and health issues for the children of the victim workers should be taken care of by the authority. The RMG sector is important for Bangladesh, but it should be grown in a proper way by following the rules and resolutions of business. The structures should be built by following the Building Code; risk assessment should be done in a periodic way. Unfortunately, there is no monitoring authority for the effective implementation of Bangladesh National Building Code. The Government should establish an authority for implementation of the building code. All the buildings should have an emergency fire exit and fire safety mechanism. The institution level simulation should be established while Fire Service and Civil Defence will supervise the entire process. Every organisation should develop its contingency plan and practise the plan periodically. Rana Plaza collapse questions the search and rescue capacity of our emergency response agencies. It is highly required to enhance the emergency response and make rescue equipment available for the relevant agencies. At the initial stage of Rana Plaza tragedy, urban volunteers played a significant role for search and rescue. Urban volunteer programmes should be institutionalised by training and linking them with emergency response agencies. Non-governmental organisations set the example of coordination during rescue and rehabilitation. In order to make it robust, the government should emphasise greater involvement of public and private sectors in implementing risk reduction measures.
