Hennes & Mauritz (H&M) has allegedly failed to ensure timely workplace safety remedial work in its supplier factories in Bangladesh and also provide necessary financial support to carry out safety improvements, according to a latest report launched Thursday. The Swedish multinational retail-clothing company is ‘dramatically behind’ schedule in correcting the dangers identified by the Accord’s inspectors, thereby putting tens of thousands of workers’ lives at risk, the report, also available at the official website of the Clean Clothes Campaign (CCC), revealed. H&M, however, claimed that it is not producing apparels in any factory that doesn’t meet the Accord requirements for operation and it sees progress among factories where it is lead brand. The retailer — one out of around 200 brands which signed agreement with the Accord and is the single largest buyer of locally-made apparel products– also said it provides support in the form of long-term business and growth opportunities. Four global unions, namely, CCC, International Labour Rights Forum (ILRF), Maquila Solidarity Network, and Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) jointly prepared the report titled “Evaluation of H&M Compliance with Safety Action Plans for Strategic Suppliers in Bangladesh” based on factory inspection reports and Corrective Action Plans (CAPs) publicly disclosed by the Accord. According to the report, H&M is sourcing apparel products from some 229 local garment units and these negative results are derived from the analysis focused exclusively on its ‘platinum and gold’ suppliers that make around 60 per cent of H&M’s products in Bangladesh and benefit from a long-term partnership with the company. Of 56 Platinum and Gold factories, 36 fall under Accord while the rest under Alliance, the review said adding unfortunately, it was not possible to perform the same analysis for Alliance factories due to lack of transparency by the Alliance. The safety inspections, conducted by Accord engineers in 32 H&M Platinum and Gold factories, uncovered a total of 518 violations of structural safety requirements, 836 fire safety violations and 650 electrical safety violations, all requiring correction–an average of 62 safety violations per factory, the analysis said. The Accord identified specific corrective action required for each violation and a deadline for the completion of that action. Of all required corrective actions at H&M’s Gold and Platinum factories, the majority (52 per cent) is behind schedule. Structural renovations are most often behind schedule (71.6 per cent), followed by fire safety repairs (50.1 per cent), and then electrical repairs (37.8 per cent). Of the outstanding renovations, 47.1 per cent are at least six months past deadline and 9.8 per cent of items have still not yet been corrected more than 12 months after the deadline required in the CAP. The outstanding renovations include installation of fireproof doors, removal of locking or sliding doors from fire exits, and enclosure of stairwells – meaning that, workers may be unable to make safely exit out of a factory in an emergency. The CCC in a statement said the analysis shows that H&M has not honoured its commitments to ensure safety of workers in Bangladesh who sew its clothes. Focusing on contract factories that H&M has deemed the best performers in its supply chain on labour and environmental issues, the report shows that all of these factories have failed to meet mandated timeframes for repairs. The majority of all renovations has still not been completed despite lapsed deadlines, it added. “If only H&M was willing put the same energy into actually meeting their much-lauded sustainability commitments as they do into promoting them, we may well be closer to seeing a safer garment industry in Bangladesh,” Samantha Maher of the Clean Clothes Campaign said in the statement. The statement quoting Scott Nova of the WRC said “In the face of worldwide revulsion over the Rana Plaza catastrophe and other garment factory disasters, H&M, the largest producer of garments in Bangladesh, promised to address hazardous conditions in its contract factories there.” “It is now clear that H&M has broken this promise,” he added. Ulrika Isaksson of H&M Communication and Press Department in an email told the FE “Our own internal follow-up data shows that the factories where we are lead brand have completed nearly 60 per cent of all required improvements and scheduled for validation by the Accord.” “We have worked out solutions for all financial support requests together with our suppliers and are cooperating closely with them to remediate according to corrective and tailor-made action plans,” Ulrika added without going into details. The H&M official admitted that they are experiencing some delays due to difficulties in importing equipment, such as fire doors and sprinklers, and a shortage of requisite professional expertise in Bangladesh. When asked, Faruque Hassan, Senior Vice President of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) claimed majority of the prescribed remedial work has so far been done by the industry except some including installation of sprinklers and fire doors as they need to import which involves both time and money. “Moreover, we are not getting fund required to carry out remediation while buyers are putting pressure to cut price of products instead of increasing the rate,” he noted. According to industry circles, the retailer alone buys apparel products worth $1.6 billion annually from Bangladesh.
