The first meeting of the minimum wage board for garment workers ended Wednesday without any proposal for workers’ monthly salary.
The meeting was held at the Minimum Wage Board office premises in Dhaka.
The board members are expecting that they will be able to propose a certain amount as the minimum monthly salary for more than four million garment workers.
On the first day of the meeting, the board members mainly introduced each other, said Liaquat Ali Mollah, chairman of the wage board.
On 9 April, the labour and employment ministry formed the four permanent-member new wage board, headed by Senior District Judge Liaquat Ali Molla, to review RMG workers’ wages.
The three other members are – Bangladesh Employers’ Federation representative Moksud Belal Siddiqui, workers’ representative Jatiya Sramik League leader Sultan Ahmed, and independent member Dhaka University Professor Md Kamal Uddin.
Besides, the ministry also announced the names of two members – former president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association Md Siddiqur Rahman and Bangladesh National Garments Workers Employees League President Sirajul Islam Rony – as owners’ and workers’ representatives respectively.
As per the Bangladesh Labour Act and labour rules, the government will form a new wage board every five years and it will set a new wage structure.
In December 2018, the government-nominated board declared a new pay structure fixing the minimum wage at Tk8,000 per month.
Since early 2022, RMG workers had staged demonstrations several times demanding the formation of a new wage board and Tk24,000 as the monthly minimum wage, citing skyrocketing inflation in the country.
