Local apparel accessories makers have urged the government to allow the apex grouping to issue Utilisation Permission.”We’ve urged the government to give us the authority to issue UP for our members,” Rafez Alam Chowdhury, president of Bangladesh Garment Accessories and Packaging Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGAPMEA, told the FEHe said currently, the National Board of Revenue (NBR) issues the UP, allowing them to import raw materials, which is time-consuming.He said the apex bodies of woven and knit makers are allowed to issue UD (Utilisation Declaration) for their members. “We have developed software and website as per the required condition of the NBR. So the authorities concerned can give the permission to BGAPMEA from the upcoming budget fiscal year 2015-16.”Mr Chowdhury said the bond commissionarate office issues import entitlement that involves time and money and creates hassles for the exporters.But if BGAPMEA gets the authority to issue the import entitlement, it will help boost the export.He said although exports of garment accessories have been growing 10 per cent for last five years, exporters do not get any sort of cash incentive yet.The association head said his members need to face a three-step audit- bond audit, valuation audit and local revenue audit, which is time consuming and troublesome. “This can be done in a single audit,” he said.The BGAPMEA president noted that export-oriented garment factories get ‘continuous’ bond facilities, but the members of BPGAPMEA do not get such facilities.He demanded allowing the association members to import raw materials of pre-fabricated building at zero duties, helping them to make the factories safe.The association leaders will meet NBR officials at a pre-budget meeting along with BGMEA and BKMEA today (Wednesday).

Source: https://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/04/29/90707

A European-led retailers’ group is conducting an impact assessment on 200 ‘vulnerable’ garment factories with which it does business after tremor hit the country, people familiar with the situation said.The earthquake, which struck Nepal Saturday, also affected Bangladesh, with a series of tremors being felt in Dhaka as elsewhere in the country.The Accord assessment is aimed at determining if the factories that are producing garment items for its affiliated companies have been structurally affected by the quake.”All 11 Accord structural engineers are in the field doing immediate impact inspections at approximately 200 factories, deemed structurally most vulnerable from our initial inspections,” executive director of Accord Rob Wayss told the FE.The engineers are utilising an internationally recognised inspection protocol selected by its Chief Safety Inspector for the immediate inspections, he added.The Accord will integrate additional new safety hazards with the Corrective Action Plan for the factory and do the corresponding support and verification work, Mr Wayss noted.He said his organisation has requested the factories, which underwent inspection by the Accord to determine if the earthquake has caused any structural damage to the buildings.The Accord has formally communicated to the owners of inspected factories, requesting them to report the impact of the earthquake on their building and on any precautionary measures or investigations they have done since. The Accord, through 14 IndustriAll-linked trade unions in the country, continues to tell the workers to refuse dangerous work, he said.He added that they have also communicated with the trade unions and also with its signatory companies to inform the Accord regarding any concern they received from workers and any of its case handlers.

Source: https://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/04/29/90706

Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety has started fresh inspection at its listed garment factories following the complaints from the workers immediately after the Saturday’s earthquake. The Alliance is mindful of the impacts an earthquake of the magnitude of 7.8 that hit Kathmandu can have on structures like ready-made-garment (RMG) factories in Bangladesh, the North American buyers’ brands initiative said in a statement. “Fresh inspections must now be executed to ensure the structural safety of factories, and we have assembled a team of structural engineers, led by our Chief Safety Officer, to visit each building where there is a concern within the next 48 hours,” it added. The Alliance has received several calls to our helpline, Amader Kotha (Our Voice), from workers concerned about cracks in factory buildings following the earthquake. Our teams on the ground in Dhaka are working to ensure that all of the works to date to make RMG factories safe have not been impacted by the earthquake, it said. This earthquake and its aftershocks should be an indication of just how difficult it can be to ensure the structural safety of buildings in an earthquake zone. “While we have not yet seen immediate damage at our ready-made-garment factories in Bangladesh, this does not mean those buildings are structurally sound following this earthquake and its aftershocks,” it noted further. The Alliance has urged all factories in Bangladesh to work with them to undertake immediate structural safety inspections and to prevent workers from entering factories until they are deemed structurally safe. Officials of the Alliance’s Dhaka office said they got complaints of having cracks in some 21 garment factories and they have already visited 13 out of them and found no safety risk there.

Source: https://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/04/28/90610

Wal-Mart, JC Penney, The Children’s Place and the government of Bangladesh have been sued by the victims and the families of the victims of the Rana Plaza collapse. The lawsuit, filed in the federal court in Washington, claims the retailers and the government were aware of the unsafe working conditions.When the eight-story building collapsed on April 24 two years ago, over 1,100 people were killed and about 2,515 people were injured.“Defendants knew, or with the exercise of reasonable diligence, should have known, that the Rana Plaza facility was not safe for human habitation,” said the lawsuit filed with the US District Court for the District of Columbia on Thursday. The Bangladesh government breached its duty to its citizens by failing to properly inspect the building, failing to ensure compliance with local construction standards and failing to ensure the safety of factory workers, the lawsuit states. Retail defendants breached their duty to workers in the building by failing to implement standards and oversight mechanisms designed to ensure the health and safety of workers who manufactured clothing for their stores, it added. According to the complaint, the retailers profit from the system of sourcing through subcontractors.“Although retailer defendants, and other Western buyers, contain strong language in their public policies against non-transparent subcontracting, factory owners report that many buyers turn a blind eye to the subcontracting practice.”The day before the collapse, cracks were found in the building and an engineer declared the building unsafe. “Since it’s a pending legal matter, we’re going to decline the opportunity to comment,” said JC Penney spokeswoman Daphne Avila.

Source: https://www.thedailystar.net/business/rana-plaza-victims-sue-retailers-government-us-court-79447

Success stories are always full of sweet and sour events since achievements do not come on a silver platter. What could be a better example of this than our garment industry? The industry that emerged as a small non-traditional sector in export in the late 1970s has now become crucial to our economy as the main source of export earnings and employment generation. Beginning its journey with only 130 workers and export earnings of $12,000, it is now a $25-billion sector that employs around 4.4 million people, 80 percent of whom are women. Now we are the second largest apparel exporting country in the world and the sector has been contributing to the economy with export earnings, employment generation, women empowerment and poverty alleviation for the last 35 years.Was the sector’s journey rosy? The answer is a simple no. It has faced a number of challenges, including child labour issues, multi-fibre arrangement phase-out, and global recession.We have dealt with these challenges and been able to sustain growth. However, the biggest challenge for the industry emerged after the tragic building collapse in 2013. Many thought the incident would mark the end of the sector’s journey. But what we have seen is a new beginning. The industry that transformed the economy and lives of millions of people has itself been transformed.The collapse of the Rana Plaza building was a wake-up call for us — a call to turn around and build a safe and sustainable industry. We can proudly say that as a nation, we have once again proved that we can face any challenge, be it natural or manmade. Given the size of our apparel industry, ensuring worker safety in the garment factories was a daunting task for us but we took up the challenge and it is heartening to see that significant progress has been made in the areas of safety, including fire, and electrical and structural safety, in the garment factories.For the first time in the history of the global garment industry, all stakeholders have realised that ensuring safety and wellbeing of the workers is a shared responsibility and this feeling has inspired governments, brands, buyers, suppliers, entrepreneurs, and workers to work hand-in-hand.This is probably the only instance in the world where brands and buyers who compete with each other have come together to make an industry safe and sustainable. European brands and buyers formed the Accord on Fire and Building Safety while the North American ones initiated the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety. The National Tripartite Action Plan for Building and Fire Safety was adopted by the government as well. Till now, 2,643 factories have been inspected by three initiatives — 1,261 by Accord, 647 by Alliance and 735 factories by National Action Plan.What is more encouraging is that only around 1.25 percent of the inspected factories were found vulnerable and closed down immediately. All the inspection reports of the factories are available at the Fair Factory Clearinghouse (FFC) database, which is accessible by all the buyers, making our progress ever more transparent and credible.Moreover, factories are implementing corrective action plans provided by Accord and Alliance. The government has taken a number of steps to augment the safety initiatives. The Directorate of Inspection for Factories and Establishments has been upgraded to the status of a department. The government has recruited 200 inspectors, made the import of safety equipment duty-free and launched a safety hotline for workers. Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association also took a number of steps to supplement workplace safety efforts by forming a team of 35 fire trainers in December 2013. This team trained 83,678 workers and staff members in 2,386 factories. BGMEA runs a “crash programme” on fire safety and so far 20,188 personnel of 2,342 factories have been trained. We have also made significant progress in the areas of knowledge, awareness and rights issues. The Labour Law 2006 was amended within just 90 days of the building collapse, making the law more favourable towards ensuring worker rights. The dramatic progress in new trade union registration is a tangible result of this amendment. Until 2012, there were only 138 trade unions in the sector; from January 2013 till now, 304 new trade unions have been registered. The minimum wage of the garment workers has also been increased by 219 percent over the past five years. The Better Work Programme has been launched by International Labour Organisation and International Finance Corporation. There goes an old adage that every cloud has a silver lining and it best relates to our garment industry. When all the inspections will be over and the factories complete their corrective action plans, the garment industry of Bangladesh can be regarded as the safest industry in the world. The writer is the vice-president of BGMEA and editor of the Apparel Story.

Source: https://www.thedailystar.net/business/paradigm-shift-garment-industry-79464

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) has announced a three-year Worker Empowerment Program in Bangladesh to support labour rights, union organising and women’s empowerment in the ready-made garment sector. The announcement coincides with the second anniversary of the April 24, 2013 Rana Plaza garment factory collapse in Dhaka that killed over 1,100 workers and injured over 2,500, said a statement of USAID released on Friday in its website. “USAID Worker Empowerment Program demonstrates the United States’ vigilance in promoting fundamental labor rights, including workplace safety and health, so tragedies such as Rana Plaza can be prevented in the future,” said Jonathan Stivers, USAID assistant administrator for Asia. “We have partnered with the government of Bangladesh, international donors, and the garment industry to empower workers by giving them a real voice in this vital sector and to reform labor laws consistent with international standards.” The new Worker Empowerment Programme aims at strengthening the capacity of independent workers’ organisations by empowering the workers in these organisations, and particularly women workers, with the skills and support necessary to protect their rights, promote their interests and improve conditions in their workplace and community. This program complements the existing Global Labour Programme that trains workers on labour laws, provides legal support to workers and assists workers in organising and registering new unions. Since inception, this program has registered nearly 300 new labor unions in the ready-made garment industry, covering more than 65,000 workers. The European Union and the United States, in close cooperation with the ILO, will remain closely engaged with the government of Bangladesh in the spirit of partnership to continue work together to ensure that economic growth and sustainable development go hand-in hand with workers’ safety and rights, read the statement. Rana Plaza, an eight-storey building located at Savar that housed five RMG factories collapsed on April 24, 2013, killing over 1,135 workers and injuring over 2,500 people. Following the factory disaster, the workers rights issues came under the spotlight and the global community including Bangladesh government and the sector people have taken steps to ensure workers’ rights in the workplace.

Source: https://www.dhakatribune.com/business/2015/apr/27/usaid-announces-programme-empower-workers-bangladesh#sthash.sQ6q1oHA.dpuf

Speakers at a programme in the district have slammed the ready-made garment owners for not playing due role for the sake of the children who lost their father or mother in the Rana Plaza disaster that claimed 1,135 lives on April 24, 2013. The participants made the statement in an event titled “Sishu Conference” hosted by Sishu Palli Plus at Tengra village in Sreepur upazila yesterday, where the children who are being benefited from the organisation were present as well. Speaker Md Saifur Rahman, Sreepur social welfare officer, said whereas the country’s RMG owners, who have become rich by dint of the labour of the workers, have remained indifferent to the suffering of the children, in this regard many foreigners including British national Rob Jenkinson have come forward with their helping hands. Sishu Palli Plus Director Sayed Shamsul Alam Chowdhury who presided over the conference said a total of 147 children of the Rana Plaza victims are getting financial assistance every month. A class-VIII student named Farzana Akter, hailing from Satvagia village in Shivchar upazila of Madaripur district, said she lost her mother in the deadly disaster and since then the organisation has been giving a donation of Tk3,500 to her and her brother each month. The assistance has immensely helped them to keep continuation of their studies, she went on. Sreepur Upazila Vice-Chairman Rafiquel Islam Mandal Bulbul and Telhati UP Chairman Abdul Baten, among others, were present in the event.

Source: https://www.dhakatribune.com/bangladesh/2015/apr/27/rmg-owners-urged-help-rana-plaza-victims-children#sthash.AD8op8Dz.dpuf

The North American brands and retailers’ group has decided to conduct fresh inspections of their listed readymade garment factories to ensure the structural safety of the units after an earthquake and its aftershocks jolted the country on Saturday. The platform, Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety, has assembled a team of structural engineers to visit each building where there is a concern. The Alliance in a news release on Sunday said the earthquake and its aftershocks should be taken as an indication of just how difficult it could be to ensure the structural safety of buildings in an earthquake zone. Although the Alliance has not seen immediate damage at their listed readymade garment factories in Bangladesh, the initiative think that does not mean that those buildings are structurally sound following the aftershocks. ‘Fresh inspections must now be executed to ensure the structural safety of factories, and we have assembled a team of structural engineers, led by our Chief Safety Officer, to visit each building where there is a concern within the next 48 hours,’ Alliance said. The retailers’ group expressed its condolences to the victims of earthquake in Nepal where more than 2,000 people died. ‘We extend our deepest condolences to earthquake victims and their families, and we will continue to take all steps possible to ensure that this tragedy does not result in injury or loss of life in Bangladesh garment factories,’ the Alliance said. Following the earthquake Alliance has received several calls from workers concerned about cracks in factory buildings and the group has taken initiative to ensure that the owners of these factories evacuate workers immediately, if necessary, it said. ‘We are also taking a number of additional measures to work with each factory owner, the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association, the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh and the Government to ensure that all workers are safe,’ the retailers’ group said. After the Rana Plaza building collapse, which killed more than 1,100 people, mostly garment workers, in April 2013, North American retailers including Walmart and Gap, formed the Alliance undertaking a five-year plan, which set timelines and accountability for inspections and training and workers empowerment programmes. The Alliance started inspection in the garment factories in February 2014 and completed primary safety assessment of its listed 600 factories in July that year. The retailers’ group found immediate risk in 19 factories and sought decision from government-established review panel. The panel decided to close five factories fully, 12 partially and allow two to operate with reduced loads. The Alliance has set a target to complete all remediation requirements and final inspections of its 600 supplier factories in the country by July 2017.

Source: https://newagebd.net/114955/quake-prompts-alliance-to-go-for-fresh-inspections/#sthash.hqMJ4WNC.dpuf

The US Agency for International Development (USAID) has declared a three-year programme for worker empowerment in Bangladesh’s readymade garment sector that caters for western users. Promoting labour rights, right to organise union and women’s empowerment in the export industry are avowed objectives of the agenda, announced on the occasion of the second anniversary of Rana Plaza tragedy. As per the announcement, the new worker-empowerment agenda aims to strengthen the capacity of independent workers’ organisations by empowering workers, particularly women workers, with the skills and support necessary to protect their rights, promote their interests and improve conditions in their workplace and community. This programme complements the existing global labour programme that trains workers on labour laws, provides legal support to workers, and assists them in organising and registering new unions. Since inception, this programme has registered nearly 300 new labour unions in the readymade garment industry, covering more than 65,000 workers, said a USAID press release Sunday. It said the announcement on the new programme coincides with the second anniversary of Rana Plaza garment factory collapse in Dhaka that killed over 1,100 workers and injured over 2,500. On this occasion, Jonathan Stivers, USAID Assistant Administrator for Asia, said USAID’s Worker Empowerment Program demonstrates the United States’ vigilance in promoting fundamental labour rights, including workplace safety and health, so tragedies such as Rana Plaza can be prevented in the future. “We have partnered with the Government of Bangladesh, international donors, and the garment industry to empower workers by giving them a real voice in this vital sector and to reform labor laws consistent with international standards.” The announcement also said the European Union and the United States, in close cooperation with the ILO, will remain closely engaged with the Government of Bangladesh in the spirit of partnership to continue their work together to ensure that economic growth and sustainable development go hand in hand with workers’ safety and rights.

Source: https://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/04/27/90443

Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments (DIFE) closed three buildings on Saturday in Narayanganj finding workers’ safety at risk, officials said. The three buildings that accommodated more than a dozen factories mainly produced apparel products including hosiery, knitwear and shirt collars for the local market. “We have closed the buildings due to cracks found there. It might have occurred due to the earthquakes,” DIFE Inspector (Narayanganj) Farhana Kabir told the FE. Being informed by Police that the buildings tilted, the DIFE with concerned magistrate sealed the three buildings, she said adding there was also existence of cracks. One building at the holding number 65/14, Nayamati, Narayanganj, housed about 16 factories, she said adding most of them did not even have a name and they produced hosiery and other products. When asked she said the factories were announced closed immediately after the earthquake and they could not get detailed information about the remaining two buildings-holding number 65/20 and 65/22. None of the two buildings’ authorities could be contacted till Sunday, she added. Meanwhile, a good number of garment workers in different industrial belts especially in Dhaka, Ashulia, Savar, Gazipur and Narayanganj were injured while rushing out in panic during Sunday’s earthquake. “Some 100-150 workers in different industrial zones were injured when they rushed to go out from the factory buildings in panic,” Industrial Police Director General Abdus Salam said. They came out from the factories at noon and did not join the workplace, he added. 50 per cent of the production remained suspended during Saturday and Sunday due to the earthquake panic and most of the factories especially in Ashulia and Gazipur remained closed, Md Shahidullah Azim, vice president of Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association said.

Source: https://www.thefinancialexpress-bd.com/2015/04/27/90463