e_Paper 24-04-2017

Opinion 13
DT
MONDAY, APRIL 24, 2017
Remember Rana Plaza all year round
People all round the world can and should do more than simply wait for April 24
We tend to forget, but the victims and their families have to live with the aftermath every single day
NASHIRUL ISLAM
• Niaz Alam
Each and every one of us
who didn’t have a loved
one killed or injured
at Rana Plaza, or isn’t
actually working every day in
the garment sector, whether in
Bangladesh or around the world,
needs to do more.
It is not good enough to wait till
April 24 dawns to remember the
dead.
Families of the 1,135 people
killed in the Rana Plaza tragedy
on April 24, 2013, the thousands
injured and their dependants, do
not get to wait for the anniversary
to be reminded of the day their
lives were changed forever.
The bereaved and the bereft do
not get the luxury of choice. Why
should we?
We need to do more
As citizens and consumers, people
all round the world can and
should do more than simply wait
passively for April 24, because
millions of RMG workers around
the world, not just in Bangladesh,
are still in need of solidarity to
ensure their rights are upheld
and their working conditions
sustainably improved.
Relying on annual words of
remembrance is not enough.
We need to remember Rana
Plaza all year round to make sure
the phrase is no longer just a
slogan.
Brands, buyers, factory owners,
governments, auditors, unions,
NGOs, BGMEA, BKMEA, and so
on, all of them need to be kept on
their toes.
And the best way for this to
happen is for more people to
follow the issues for themselves
and to take more action to support
garment workers worldwide.
Very little has changed
Despite the appallingly large scale
of the Rana Plaza tragedy -- and
the correspondingly large scale of
efforts to respond to the problems
it highlighted -- the factors that
created the conditions for it have
not gone away.
These factors have essentially
created a paradigm in which
globally profitable industries are
unable or unwilling to ensure basic
human rights and safety standards
in their supply chains, and that
paradigm has not changed.
Not yet. At least for some time
to come.
In the meantime, four years
after the appalling loss of life at
Rana Plaza, the big questions
for the RMG industry, both in
Bangladesh and globally, remain
much the same as this time last
year.
What has been learned? What
is being done? And where are we
going?
As might be expected, the
answers, too, have changed little
from one year ago:
• Safety is no longer an
issue that can be ignored (but
inspections alone are not enough
to raise standards without finance
to invest in improvements).
• Compensation has been
provided by some brands on a
voluntary basis (but the amount of
compensation to victims’ families
is still pitiably small).
• Criminal investigations are
progressing. Slowly (but justice
seems far away).
• Stake-holder safety initiatives
like Accord and Alliance have
shown the value of co-operation
(but without more long-term
partnerships between buyers
and factories, finance for
Despite the appallingly large scale of the Rana Plaza tragedy -- and
the correspondingly large scale of efforts to respond to the problems
it highlighted –- the factors that created the conditions for it have
not gone away
improvements is still hard to come
by).
• Support from the Bangladesh
government and those of other
nations for RMG sector initiatives
are improving (but on some issues,
such as the tariffs imposed on
Bangladeshi RMG exports by the
US government, the playing field
of the global marketplace remains
far from fair).
• Growing recognition of the
value of improving workers’
rights by some factory owners and
officials (but much continuing
instinctive, legal, institutional, and
industry association hostility to
trade unions).
• Bangladesh’s overall RMG
exports are continuing to grow,
and a growing number of more
successful producers are investing
in design, greening factories, and
climbing the value chain (but
will this be fast enough to make
up for jobs lost elsewhere from
competition and consolidation?).
Let’s do our bit
This is where we the people come
in.
Promoting the vision of a safe,
sustainable, well-paid, and more
productive garment industry
in Bangladesh is an apt way to
honour the memory of victims
and show that we have learned the
lessons from Rana Plaza.
And plenty of industry insiders
agree -- in principle.
But if more customers and
voters, in Bangladesh and around
the world, do not demand this be
so, it will not happen in practice.
We must do more to keep
the pressure up, not only on
anniversaries, but all year round.
And we can do that actively
whenever we go shopping, invest
in a business, speak to a politician,
or write to the press.
Do not let the dead and injured
of Rana Plaza be victims in vain. •
Niaz Alam is a member of the Editorial
Board of Dhaka Tribune. A qualified
lawyer, he has worked on corporate
responsibility and ethical business
issues since 1992. He sat on the Board
of the London Pensions Fund Authority
between 2001-2010 and is a former
vice-chair of War on Want.