The fate of the much-hyped ‘Garment Village’ project at Gajaria in Munshiganj, by all indications, is sealed for now. The reason behind the move falling through is high prices of land. The Chinese company that had signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) in June, 2014 for building the village at an estimated cost of $1.2 billion, as reported in this paper late last week, has lately been showing all signs of backing out from the project. There was much foot-dragging on initiating its works and subsequently a feasibility study was commissioned. The study has reportedly found that the project is not financially feasible because of high prices of land at its proposed site. Moreover, the apparel unit owners have also expressed their unwillingness to buy land at prices higher than the running one in the market. Thus, the official initiative to set up an industrial park having all the necessary facilities exclusively for the export-oriented garment factories is facing a premature death. Now officials concerned are hoping to accommodate the apparel units in the economic zones (EZs) that the government plans to set up across the country.  However, the execution of the EZs might also face a daunting challenge because of land scarcity and its high prices. Land is the scarcest resource in this country and the people do not transfer the same unless situation compels them to do so. Under such circumstances, the land prices – and that too in areas near the capital city – have shot up to a prohibitive level. The move to get all the garment units in and around Dhaka in one place was a great idea, for the factories would have then got all the utility and other services, effluent plants, accommodation  for workers, factory sheds etc., ready and without any trouble. From the management perspective, the ‘Garment Village’ concept would have also made things rather easier for the government. Keeping constant watch over 4,500 garment units, located sporadically in Dhaka and its adjoining areas and in Chittagong, remains a tough job particularly during any restive situation.  The proposed ‘Garment Village’ would have solved this problem to a great extent. Meanwhile, the scarcity of land and its high prices are driving away many prospective investors, both local and foreign. There are, of course, other shortcomings. But the land issue has emerged as the number one. This is obviously so in a country where the land-man ratio is the lowest in the world—0.06 hectare per person, according to 2013 FAO estimate. Here the problem is that the country did never have appropriate land administration, land use plan and land management policies in place. There have been enough of talks about improving the situation. But because of the built-in systemic deficiencies and widespread corruption, no notable progress has yet been made to this end. Notwithstanding this, the government cannot give up efforts and remain a mute spectator to an otherwise lacklustre investment situation in the private sector, largely because of scarcity of land. Investors would not certainly go to all the places the government would select for building industries or economic zones. They would do their own arithmetic, prior to choosing locations for putting in their money.  Land is a basic factor of production and the policymakers would be required to take all possible and also feasible steps to facilitate the entrepreneurs getting it at an affordable cost.

The labour ministry is going to take legal action against 319 readymade garment factories that are structurally vulnerable. To this effect the Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments started issuing notices to the units which have failed to comply with the government recommendations to make the units safer, DIFE officials said. Preliminary safety assessments in 1,549 readymade garment factories have been conducted under the national initiative with the support of International Labour Organisation. Of 1,549 factories, 319 were identified as having vulnerable structures and the factory authorities were asked to conduct detailed engineering assessment of their factory buildings to find out the safety factors due to lack of structural design and drawing. The DIFE officials said that out of 319 factories, 22 completed DEA, 38 started process and four factories were closed under the recommendations of the government set review panel. As many as 255 factories are yet to start the process for conducting DEA and some of them disagreed to go through the process. ‘Most of the factories which have been asked to conduct the DEA are yet to start the process and some of them have disagreed to do so. We have started issuing notice to the factories so that their authorities can start the process of DEA and necessary remediation works,’ Syed Ahmed, inspector general of the DIFE, told New Age on Tuesday. He said that the letters, asking to know the status of factory remediation, had been sent to the four district offices of the DIFE and the offices would forward the letters to the factory concerns. After receiving the letter from the DIFE the factory authorities will have to inform their remediation progress to the department within seven days; otherwise, they have to face legal action as per the labour act, Syed said. He also said that the factories which would not comply with the government recommendation to ensure safety would have to face closure. According to the DIFE statistics, corrective action plan implement progress in 73 factories is zero, 286 factories achieved zero progress in structural remediation, 160 factories made no progress in electrical remediation and 129 factories made zero progress in implementing fire safety-related corrective action plan. After the Rana Plaza building collapse, which killed more than 1,100 people, mostly garment workers, in April 2013, North American retailers constituted the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety and European retailers formed the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh undertaking a five-year plan which set timelines and accountability for inspections and training and workers’ empowerment programmes in the factories from where they procure products. At the same time the government in association with the ILO launched another inspection programme in the RMG factories which are not suppliers of the Accord and Alliance signatories. The Alliance has so far inspected more than 800 factories while the Accord inspected more than 1,600 factories.

Four international labour rights organisations have claimed that Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety overstates progress in Bangladesh’s RMG sector, keeping its workers’ lives at risk. The safety hazards exist in the factories that are stitching clothes for Walmart, Gap, VF Corporation, Target and Hudson’s Bay Company, and their European subsidiaries Asda, Galeria Kaufhof and Galeria Inno. In summer 2013, these retailers joined the Alliance, a platform of North American buyers, to improve safety standards in the clothing industry and pledged to make their supplier factories in Bangladesh safe. International Labor Rights Forum, Worker Rights Consortium, Clean Clothes Campaign, and Maquila Solidarity Network in its analysis titled “Dangerous Delays on Worker Safety” revealed considerable delays in repairing safety defects in factories supplying member companies of the Alliance. The analysis was published on Monday. “Walmart, Gap, VF, Target and Hudson’s Bay have failed to address deadly hazards in many factories, but Bangladesh alliance downplays the problem with rosy status reports,” the workers’ rights group said in the analysis. Even more concerning is the fact that the Alliance overstates progress, saying many of the factories listed as “on track” on the Alliance website still face major safety hazards, the analysis found. These rights groups made the analysis on 175 RMG factories which are covered by both the Accord and the Alliance and supply the five mentioned retailers. As per the report, of the factories in the sample that the Alliance designates as “On Track”, 41% have uncorrected structural problems, 57% have compromised fire exits and 58% do not have a properly functioning fire alarm system. It also stated that 62% still lack viable fire exits, 62% do not have a properly functioning fire alarm system and 47% have major uncorrected structural problems. These brands, despite knowing these risks for a considerable time, have failed to make sure these factories are safe, the workers rights platform said. The Alliance’s approach to reporting safety progress legitimately raises the question whether the Alliance is prioritising the protection of its member brands’ reputations over the protection of workers, it questioned. While the Accord is a multi-stakeholder initiative with an important role for workers’ representatives and a high level of transparency, the Alliance is more similar to the pre-Rana Plaza models of corporate responsibility programmes. It is controlled entirely by the companies themselves and has limited and selective reporting, the independent analysis stated. The detailed Accord inspection reports show that more than half of these factories, which were all first inspected over one and a half years ago, still do not have appropriate fire exits, lack an approved fire alarm system or have major structural problems, it added. Sam Maher from Clean Clothes Campaign states: “As we have been forced to rely on reporting by the Accord for this recent assessment we can only judge progress in the limited group where both initiatives are playing a role in improving repairs. “Because of the lack of transparency in the Alliance reporting we have no way of knowing if the risks are even more severe in those workplaces where no public scrutiny is possible.” The Alliance should correct its false claims of progress and start providing detailed and accurate information concerning the status of each safety renovation in its factories in order to be able to start working on a safer Bangladeshi garment industry, the rights group suggested. These hazards could prevent workers from escaping a potentially deadly fire or lead to injury or death as a result of structural failure of a factory building, it narrated.