Compliance issues in the RMG sector
Friday, 7 December 2007
Md Obaidullah
The buyers cannot be blamed in many cases for demanding compliance with the issues such as payment of adequate salaries to workers and other benefits to them as well as ensuring of safe working condition. Lawmakers, environmental and different civic groups in the importing countries have been making demands to ensure compliance with these standards and the businesses find it hard to ignore them. However, some of the buyers are noted to be making their exclusive demand on RMG exporters from Bangladesh under the guise of meeting standards.
It is also a fact that RMG producers from Bangladesh have been rather late in waking up to these issues on which depend the sustainability of their export activities. But it is also not wholly true that they are quite stranger to the issue of awareness and there are many RMG units which have taken comprehensive measures recognising that this is indispensable for the secured growth of their exports. But there are also other industries that have not acted on the compliance issues. It is imperative for the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) to take the initiative in identifying such non-compliant units and warn them as well as extend all sorts of assistance to them in meeting the compliance requirements. The goal should be one of achieving full compliance by all the RMG units at the earliest for the longer term security of the sector as a whole.
The owners of the RMG industries should appreciate the fact that any improvements made in the areas of monetary and other benefits of workers, plus their working conditions, would only hedge them against the breakout of the kind of troubles that were to all appearances about to deal fatal blows to this sector in the closing months of 2006. The RMG industries have resumed normal functioning to a great degree since these events. But workers' discontent is simmering which does not augur well for the industry in any way.
Thus the owners would be both meeting compliance requirements as well as making their enterprises secure against explosion of workers' wrath by taking and implementing decisions to increase wages and other benefits for the workers. Of course, non-monetary benefits including comfortable and safe working conditions should form part of the package of incentives to be given to workers.
The BGMEA made a suggestion that the buyers on their own should make a gesture to the RMG exporters by clearly and more significantly as well as uniformly stating what the compliance issues are so that the RMG producers can attempt to tackle them not in an isolated or piecemeal way but in its totality. As it is, one RMG unit can be confronted with one compliance issue and another with a completely different one or a unique one. Once the buyers have presented the whole set of compliance issues with the assurance that new ones will not be progressively added to them, it then would become easier for the RMG exporters to absorb them knowing that they would not be pestered with new demands. The BGMEA proposal merits a serious consideration by the buyers. However, the BGMEA on its own needs also to engage in immediate negotiations with the buyers to settle these issues finally.
There is also another very important issue that the BGMEA should settle with the buyers. This involves the prices paid for the apparels. Garments exported from Bangladesh are still the cheapest in the world. But in recent times, the buyers have been resorting to arm-twisting to force our RMG exporters to accept less and less prices for their products. At the same time, they are pressing Bangladeshi garments industries hard to meet their demands of compliance. The meeting of these demands has raised the cost of production for our RMG exporters. But they have not been compensated for in any way for their extra spending on compliance through even marginal in increase in the price of their products by the buyers. But this is sheer hypocrisy and bad business practice. The BGMEA should act forcefully to make the buyers see reason to pay higher prices for the garments products from Bangladesh.
The buyers cannot be blamed in many cases for demanding compliance with the issues such as payment of adequate salaries to workers and other benefits to them as well as ensuring of safe working condition. Lawmakers, environmental and different civic groups in the importing countries have been making demands to ensure compliance with these standards and the businesses find it hard to ignore them. However, some of the buyers are noted to be making their exclusive demand on RMG exporters from Bangladesh under the guise of meeting standards.
It is also a fact that RMG producers from Bangladesh have been rather late in waking up to these issues on which depend the sustainability of their export activities. But it is also not wholly true that they are quite stranger to the issue of awareness and there are many RMG units which have taken comprehensive measures recognising that this is indispensable for the secured growth of their exports. But there are also other industries that have not acted on the compliance issues. It is imperative for the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) to take the initiative in identifying such non-compliant units and warn them as well as extend all sorts of assistance to them in meeting the compliance requirements. The goal should be one of achieving full compliance by all the RMG units at the earliest for the longer term security of the sector as a whole.
The owners of the RMG industries should appreciate the fact that any improvements made in the areas of monetary and other benefits of workers, plus their working conditions, would only hedge them against the breakout of the kind of troubles that were to all appearances about to deal fatal blows to this sector in the closing months of 2006. The RMG industries have resumed normal functioning to a great degree since these events. But workers' discontent is simmering which does not augur well for the industry in any way.
Thus the owners would be both meeting compliance requirements as well as making their enterprises secure against explosion of workers' wrath by taking and implementing decisions to increase wages and other benefits for the workers. Of course, non-monetary benefits including comfortable and safe working conditions should form part of the package of incentives to be given to workers.
The BGMEA made a suggestion that the buyers on their own should make a gesture to the RMG exporters by clearly and more significantly as well as uniformly stating what the compliance issues are so that the RMG producers can attempt to tackle them not in an isolated or piecemeal way but in its totality. As it is, one RMG unit can be confronted with one compliance issue and another with a completely different one or a unique one. Once the buyers have presented the whole set of compliance issues with the assurance that new ones will not be progressively added to them, it then would become easier for the RMG exporters to absorb them knowing that they would not be pestered with new demands. The BGMEA proposal merits a serious consideration by the buyers. However, the BGMEA on its own needs also to engage in immediate negotiations with the buyers to settle these issues finally.
There is also another very important issue that the BGMEA should settle with the buyers. This involves the prices paid for the apparels. Garments exported from Bangladesh are still the cheapest in the world. But in recent times, the buyers have been resorting to arm-twisting to force our RMG exporters to accept less and less prices for their products. At the same time, they are pressing Bangladeshi garments industries hard to meet their demands of compliance. The meeting of these demands has raised the cost of production for our RMG exporters. But they have not been compensated for in any way for their extra spending on compliance through even marginal in increase in the price of their products by the buyers. But this is sheer hypocrisy and bad business practice. The BGMEA should act forcefully to make the buyers see reason to pay higher prices for the garments products from Bangladesh.