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23 April 2024 Eleven years after Rana Plaza: Textile factories safer, triggers of the disaster remain

Press release of the Clean Clothes Campaign 22.04.2024

Wednesday, April 24, 2024, marks the 11th anniversary of the worst tragedy in the fashion industry: the collapse of the Rana Plaza building in Dhaka, Bangladesh, which killed 1,138 people. On this occasion, Artemisa Ljarja from the Campaign for Clean Clothes Germany draws the following conclusion: "Although unprecedented progress has been made in improving safety in factories since then, the brutal crackdown on the protests for the increase in the minimum wage shows that fashion brands producing in Bangladesh still do not ensure that basic rights are respected in their supply chains."

Bangladesh ACCORD: Binding agreement makes factories safer

In 2013, the disaster prompted some of these brands to sign a binding agreement with international trade unions that has been proven to make factories in Bangladesh safer and prevent mass accidents: the Bangladesh ACCORD for fire and building safety. The agreement is considered a success by brands and civil society alike and is currently being extended to other countries, including Pakistan.

The Clean Clothes Campaign, whose international umbrella network Clean Clothes Campaign is also an observing member of the ACCORD, is calling on major brands such as Levi's, IKEA, Amazon, Decathlon, Tom Tailor, New Yorker to join the agreement and finally end the free-riding they have been doing for over a decade in their production in Bangladesh.

4 dead in minimum wage protests – brands refused to support

At the end of 2023, international brands refused to support an increase in the Bangladeshi minimum wage to the equivalent of 195 euros per month demanded by workers. The then highly undemocratic wage review process led to a new minimum wage of 12,500 taka (107 euros) – just over half of what the unions had demanded on the basis of cost-of-living calculations and an even smaller fraction of a living wage.

When workers exercised their basic rights and demonstrated against the undemocratic wage-setting process, the brands did not prevent the predictable and deliberate repression, but tacitly agreed to the violent measures that killed four workers and injured many more. The four dead (Rasel Howlader, 26, Jalal Uddin, 40, Anjuara Khatun, 23, Imran Hossain, 32) produced for international brands such as H&M, Zara, C&A, Bestseller and Walmart. "The deaths in the supply chains of brand manufacturers are an expression of a serious failure in corporate due diligence," states Artemisa Ljara.

European Supply Chain Act comes on Rana Plaza anniversary

On 24 April 2024, the European Parliament will vote on the so-called Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD). From 2027, the directive obliges corporations to take preventive action and, among other things, to check their supply chain for such human rights risks and to counteract these risks. In the event of future violations of their duties of care, the law also provides for civil liability. In doing so, the CSDDD also goes beyond the German Supply Chain Due Diligence Act, which has been in force since 2023. This is necessary, according to Artemisa Ljarja: "The recent events in Bangladesh show how much work global fashion brands still have to do to comply with these new legal due diligence obligations in the field of human rights."

Contact

Artemisa Ljarja,
Eilaktionskoordinatorin der Kampagne für Saubere Kleidung e.V.
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+4915730429041