A corruption watchdog has reported that 90 percent of the various commitments made by stakeholders to improve conditions of garments industry since the collapse of Rana Plaza has either been implemented completely or is in the process of implementation.
Transparency International Bangladesh (TIB) released the study titled “Governance Challenges in the Ready-made Garments Sector: Pledges and Progress” on Monday at a press conference in the city.
The study found that several industry stakeholders took a total of 102 initiatives of varying dimensions against 54 out of 63 types of governance challenges identified by TIB in its earlier report released on October 31 last year.
Of the 102 initiatives, 31 percent had been implemented completely, 60 percent witnessed varying degrees of progress in implementation while only nine percent remained unaddressed, the new report said.
The agency called for the formation of a garments sector governance authority to coordinate governance initiatives in the readymade garments sector.
“An overall 90 percent implementation of commitments is a very positive thing. The government has taken the matter quite seriously, which will have an impact at the national and international level,” TIB Executive Director Iftekharuzzaman told the press.
He said the initiatives that have not been taken include establishing a lead ministry for the sector, forming a workers’ welfare fund and introduction of trade union and federation policies. He also commended initiatives taken by the government, various government departments, BGMEA, factory owners, buyers and their representative bodies that emerged since the tragedy.
“Governance challenges in the sector are multi-dimensional while corruption has been pervasive, which needed extraordinary efforts to deal with and the stakeholders have shown the commitment to face those head on,” he said.
The absence of sufficient penalties against non-compliance and delay in bringing to justice those responsible for the tragedies are the chief barriers to establishing good governance in the sector, the TIB report said.
It said several positive steps had been taken to establish rule of law in the sector since the Rana Plaza tragedy. However, charges are yet to be pressed in the Rana Plaza-related cases. There are long delays in cases at the labour court and there is negligence on behalf of monitoring agencies in taking action — all of which serve as negative factors, it said.
TIB Trustee Board member Sultana Kamal said proper coordination was required on workers’ rights issues.
“We expect the government and owners to play a better role in preserving long-term and fundamental workers’ rights,” she said.
The report said positive initiatives had only laid the necessary foundations which were far from sufficient to yield a sustainable change.
It said that despite the government’s assurance, there was no visible progress in relocating the garment factories in the Garment Palli (garment village) at Gazaria in Munshiganj district.
The report said that dilly-dally in bringing to justice those responsible for accidents in the garment factories also created frustration. The pace of inspection of the factories by the government, foreign buyers and their forums was very slow and that there was no transparency in some cases.
In the country’s worst-ever industrial disaster, over 1,100 people were killed and over 2,000 others injured – mostly readymade garment workers – when a nine-storey building Rana Plaza collapsed at Savar on the outskirts of the capital on April 24 last year.
Source: Bd news24
