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This report demonstrates how the business model of fashion brands and the structure of global garment supply chains create and sustain poverty wages for garment workers. We explore how persistently low wages continue to be the foundation of the industry despite policy commitments to pay a living wage. Elements of supply chains that impact wage levels are: the indirect employment relationship with supply chain workers; the global race to the bottom on labour costs which suppress national minimum wage increases; and the unequal power relationship between brands and suppliers which allow brands to dictate the terms of production, often at the expense of suppliers.

Between August 2020 and February 2021, Business & Human Rights Resource Centre (BHRRC) approached 16 brands for a response to allegations of unpaid wages and benefits (wage theft). All brands included in the report have policy commitments to ensure workers in their supply chain are paid. Ten go further and explicitly refer to aspirations to pay a living wage, with five of these brands members of the key voluntary initiative on living wage payment, Action Collaboration Transformation (ACT). Yet the existence of voluntary initiatives on living wages has failed to result in the payment of living wages to garment workers or even an increase in the wage level.

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MODE. MACHT. MENSCHEN. ist ein Dokumentarfilmprojekt von Regisseur Patrick Kohl über die Textil- und Bekleidungsindustrie in Kambodscha.

Der Film unterteilt sich in acht Episoden und ist auf youtube verfügbar.

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Fast Fashion hat die Textilbranche von Grund auf verändert. Die Bekleidungsindustrie überschüttet den Planeten geradezu mit Textilien: 56 Millionen Tonnen Kleidung werden jährlich verkauft. Influencer und Neuromarketing sorgen für steigenden Absatz. Doch die Billigkleidung hat einen hohen Preis wie etwa prekäre Beschäftigungsverhältnisse und die katastrophale Umweltbilanz.

Die Doku beleuchtet verschiedene Aspekte der Fast Fashion Industrie.

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The questions explored in this report are related to the purchasing practices of brands and retailers as they place new orders with suppliers during the continued Covid-19 pandemic.

How are brands responding to their business partners’ distressed circumstances? Are they treating suppliers fairly? Or are brands and retailers taking advantage of suppliers’ desperation to extract price discounts and other concessions? How are current trends in order volume and pricing affecting the viability of suppliers? What will be the impact on the tens of millions of workers who sew apparel for their livelihood?

To answer these questions, this report examines the findings from a new survey of apparel suppliers conducted during July and August of 2020. It also draws on recent trade data, interviews with stakeholders, quarterly financial reports, and other sources.

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Low wage women workers are least likely to have access to limited social safety nets, and most earn wages too low to save. As economies contract and millions of workers are fired, older women are among the first to lose their jobs. The unprecedented impacts of COVID-19 are deep and far-reaching, affecting the health and livelihoods of more than 150 million workers in global supply chains and 40 million workers in fast fashion supply chains—a workforce largely made up of women. Government and corporate responses to COVID-19 have exposed vast structural inequalities created by supply chain production models.

This report reviews the gendered impact of COVID-19—and the need for a transformational approach to prevent and end GBVH using guidance from C190*—in the context of Asian fast fashion supply chains which produce primarily consumer apparel and footwear. The report highlights the persistent risk factors for violence that both predate and are exacerbated by COVID-19. It provides detailed guidance for fast fashion lead firms on steps they can take to uphold C190 obligations to address violence on garment supply chains in context of the global public health crisis and the economic shocks caused by the COVID-19 pandemic. While this report focuses on fast fashion supply chains, the guidance for corporate accountability to achieve violence free workplaces provides an important roadmap across global supply chain sectors.

* C190 is the first international labor standard to lay out a gender-inclusive approach to addressing violence in the world of work and measures to end GBVH, including addressing risks associated with discrimination, unequal relationships of power and occupational health and safety

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