18 April 2017 Never again Rana Plaza: Trade unions prevent tragedy in Bangladeshi textile factory Workers of a partially collapsed factory protest for their safety Workers protest to the Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments (DIFE) for necessary renovations and building safety in textile factories. Photo: © NGWF On the afternoon of April 5, 2017, parts of the 15-story Ananta Plaza factory building collapsed in Bangladesh's capital Dhaka, while around 3,000 seamstresses worked inside the building. The two factories located in the building, Ananta Fashion and Ananta Apparels Ltd, produce for H&M, C&A, Zara, Mango, Marks & Spencer, GAP, Levis, Jack & Jones and Abercrombie & Fitch, among others. Although no one was harmed, the incident was strongly reminiscent of the Rana Plaza disaster in April 2013. Here, more than 1,100 people were killed in the collapse of a factory complex, over 2,000 were partially seriously injured. The fact that there was no repetition of the tragedy in this case is mainly due to the rapid reactions of workers and trade unions, who pushed for the immediate closure of the factory after the collapse of the rooms on the ground floor. In the following days, trade unionists and workers protested to the authority responsible for security to close the factories until the necessary renovations were completed. The result of the Bangladesh Accord inspections demanded by the trade unions was the temporary closure of the factory until various security gaps were eliminated. To secure the building, more than 110,000 liters of earth were deposited. In addition, the unions ensured that all workers continued to be paid wages for the period of closure. On 12 April 2017, operations in the factories were resumed and management agreed to have the building fully renovated as soon as possible in accordance with the inspectors' recommendations. Now it is also the duty of the purchasing companies to commit to the complete refurbishment of Ananta Plaza and to ensure adequate safety standards in all their supplier factories in order to prevent a tragedy due to a lack of safety precautions in the Bangladeshi clothing industry in the future. Further reports in the blog 'Stonger Unions'
