About 56.6 percent of the recommended remediation works have been completed by the member garment factories of Accord, a platform of 210 mostly Europe-based retailers. The engineers and experts of the Accord found more than 84,000 electrical, fire and structural faults in the 1,550 garment factories during their preliminary inspection, which ended in September 2014.
Fire and electrical faults were the most common. The owners of the garment factories were asked to rectify the faults, said Rob Wayss, executive director of Accord, at a press briefing on the progress made in the three years since the legally binding five-year agreement was signed. Wayss said the remediation process of all the factories could be completed within the scheduled time of June 2018 as the progress rate is higher. The Accord has severed business relations with 26 factories for their non-cooperation in remediation. “No Accord member will do business with those factories as they did not agree to repair their faults.” So far, the Accord has published a progress report of 1,452 factories. Seven factories have already completed their corrective action plans, while 57 more are close to completion, he said, adding that 1,388 factories are lagging behind. Some 453 factories were given additional time for remediation. About the complaints by factory owners about the lack of financial support from Accord for remediation works, Wayss said: “No owner has demanded financial assistance yet. Every owner has been conducting the remediation with their own financing.” The Accord has been inspecting the factories with the members’ fees and a total of $30 million has been spent for inspection purposes over the last three years, Wayss said. “I hope the Accord would be able to complete the inspection and remediation with the allocated budget at $50 million for five years.” Once the work of Accord is done, a functioning and capable labour-management safety committee at the factory level would be critical for monitoring and maintaining safety compliance. The Accord has successfully run a safety committee training programme at 65 of its supplier factories that have registered trade unions, and now has designs to expand the coverage. “The pilot work done thus far makes us optimistic that safety committees will be developed that will be capable of, and would be permitted to, performing their functions.”
