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Joint PRESS RELEASE by Initiative Supply Chain Act, CorA Network, ECCHR, BUND

Berlin. A supply chain law in Germany is feasible – for companies as well as for legislators. This is shown by a legal opinion of the Initiative Supply Chain Act, prepared by legal experts of the alliance with the support of lawyer Robert Grabosch. Such a law is intended to oblige companies in Germany to better protect people and the environment in their global business.

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© Devi Adamo 2019

FEMNET has published the most important results of a new study in German

Textile companies have made great progress in recent years in disclosing information about their supply chains. This is shown in a report published in December 2019 by an alliance of trade unions, human rights groups and labour rights initiatives, including the Clean Clothes Campaign.
The short version has been translated into German by FEMNET. The report is an update of the 2017 company survey.

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Social audits are designed to monitor and ensure compliance with human rights at work. However, as a control tool, this approach has failed. This is documented in the report ‘FIG LEAF FOR FASHION - How social auditing protects brands and fails workers’ of the Clean Clothes Campaign: The multi-billion-dollar, private-sector certification and audit industry systematically protects the reputation and profits of the contracting companies instead of the rights of workers.

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Fair fashion show on Bonn's Münsterplatz at the Rundum Fair. © Tam Tran

Bonn. "All-round fair" will take place on Saturday, September 28, at Münsterplatz: As part of Fair Week 2019, an alliance of initiatives and associations invites you to a public fair breakfast from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. Fairly traded coffee, tea, spreads and many other delicacies await visitors, as well as the presentation of fair-produced clothing at a fashion show as a highlight.

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Berlin / Bonn. Today's presentation of the new ‘Green Button’ textile label by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) uses civil society in the Textile Alliance to determine a critical location. The members of the civil society alliance criticise the fact that the Green Button, like the Textile Alliance, is only a voluntary measure. However, there is an urgent need for a law that makes human rights, environmental and anti-corruption due diligence mandatory for all companies. This law must form the basis for social, ecological and economic sustainability. Voluntary measures such as the Green Button and an improved textile alliance could build on this.

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Berlin / Bonn. Today's presentation of the new ‘Green Button’ textile label by the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) uses civil society in the Textile Alliance to determine a critical location. The members of the civil society alliance criticise the fact that the Green Button, like the Textile Alliance, is only a voluntary measure. However, there is an urgent need for a law that makes human rights, environmental and anti-corruption due diligence mandatory for all companies. This law must form the basis for social, ecological and economic sustainability. Voluntary measures such as the Green Button and an improved textile alliance could build on this.

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Bonn / Berlin. The civil society organisations in the Textile Alliance criticise the roadmaps and progress reports of the member companies in the alliance. In its current form, these are not meaningful and poorly comparable. The roadmaps also showed that many companies are still at the very beginning when it comes to living wages. In addition, better working conditions in supply chains could be achieved if companies cooperate more frequently. On Monday, the Textile Alliance published roadmaps and progress reports of its members. In it, they show what measures they want to take in the field of human rights and ecology in textile production for the next year and whether planned measures were implemented in the previous year.

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Bonn. The Fair Trade Town Bonn is richer by one consumer temple. On 13.08. the fashion giant Primark opens in front of the main station with cheap clothes on 8000m2. But really cheap here is only the business model: What the commodity actually costs people and the environment, the prices do not reflect. FEMNET and Bonn im Wandel call on the day of the opening to talk about mass consumption and the future of the city. More than 20 organisations are already supporting the campaign ‘Better living without Primark’.

The Alliance's appeal is against waste, pollution and human rights violations. With information stands and changing clothes, FEMNET and Bonn are showing that things can be different. From 10 a.m., visitors can expect a colourful program in Poststraße. Politicians, organisations and citizens are invited to join the “Live better without Primark-Talk” and talk about better concepts of urban development.

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Blue Hands #Against Violence: FEMNET calls for solidarity in Bonn with the start of the campaign.
One in three textile workers are victims of structural violence in the workplace. Fashion brands aren't doing enough to protect women in their suppliers. For this reason, FEMNET is launching the campaign #Counterviolence on International Women's Day. With hands painted in blue, the supporters invite you to participate in order to set a sign against violence against women.

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Bonn/Berlin. Living wages are a key element of decent work. In the countries of the Global South, however, a large proportion of employees cannot live humanely on hard-earned wages. This also applies, and in particular, to employees in the textile and clothing industry. The Alliance for Sustainable Textiles, founded in 2014 on the initiative of Federal Development Minister Dr. Gerd Müller, has started to change this. The civil society organisations in the Textile Alliance are now calling on all members to follow their commitment to action and to step up their efforts to pay living wages.

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On World Children's Day, FEMNET petition with more than 14,100 signatures calls on fashion companies to protect the children of their seamstresses!

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Complaint against Italian testing service provider RINA, which issued a certificate to the factory despite safety deficiencies.

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