• Home
  • Tags
  • garment workers

garment workers news and archive

Business

Study: "Exploitation Made in Europe": human rights violations plague apparel production

Five days ago was the seventh anniversary of the collapse of the Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh. More than 1,100 garment workers lost their lives and thousands were injured. The event highlighted the inhuman working conditions: locked in, intimidated and grossly underpaid. Tragic, we think, but far away. New research by the Clean Clothes...

Apr 29, 2020

Business

Marks & Spencer, H&M and Bestseller detail measures to help suppliers

Marks & Spencer, H&M and Bestseller have outlined measures to help support suppliers after fashion retailers received widespread criticism in recent weeks when many companies cancelled or refused to pay for huge orders of clothing. As of the beginning of April, 1.4 billion dollars worth of orders had been cancelled and another 1.8 billion...

Apr 24, 2020

Business COMMENTARY

7 years later, has Rana Plaza prepared the industry for Covid-19?

Once again, it is the sad anniversary of the collapse of the Rana Plaza structure in Savar near Dhaka, Bangladesh, a building that housed various garment factories, the constant humming of their sewing machines, operating on two illegally constructed top floors, that made the building collapse on 24th April 2013, burying 1,132 workers and...

Apr 24, 2020

Business

Cambodia: 90,000 garment workers could lose jobs over proposed EU trade sanctions

About 90,000 Cambodian apparel and textile workers could be out of a job if the proposed trade sanctions by the European Union cause fashion brands to source elsewhere, fear workers’ rights groups. Currently, Cambodia profits from the “Everything but Arms” (EBA) scheme established in 2001 that gives 49 of the world's poorest countries duty-free...

Nov 14, 2019

Business

How the EU’s pending EBA decision affects garment workers in Cambodia

Since the European Commission announced on 11th February of this year that Cambodia could possibly lose its trade status "Everything but Arms" (EBA), some 800,000 seamstresses in Cambodia have been living in fear of losing their livelihood. In a short documentary film, non-profit think-tank Mekong Future Initiative (MFI) provides an insight into...

Nov 1, 2019

Business

Ethiopian garment workers paid the lowest wages in the apparel industry

With newly built industrial parks and a range of financial incentives, Ethiopia is working hard to become the world’s next garment exporter. “We will make Ethiopia the leading manufacturing hub in Africa”, Dr. Arkebe Oqubay, Special Economic Adviser to the country’s Prime Minister, recently said. The efforts seem to be bearing fruit, as...

May 7, 2019

Business

Factory abuse starts with brands’ purchasing behavior, says Human Rights Watch

A new report by Human Rights Watch (HRW) confirms once more that global fashion brands are contributing to unsafe and unfair working conditions at garment factories in countries like Cambodia, Myanmar, India, Pakistan and Bangladesh by pressuring suppliers to drive down prices and produce faster. The study was based on hundreds of interviews...

May 7, 2019

Fashion

Leading fashion firms call on Cambodian government to improve labour standards

Leading fashion companies including Nike, PVH, Levi Strauss, Esprit, Adidas and Under Armour have signed an open letter to the Cambodian government urging it to improve its labour standards. The companies, who claim to contribute 9.5 billion US dollars (7.26 billion pounds) to Cambodia’s exports through their work with the country’s suppliers,...

May 7, 2019

Fashion

How to convince friends to quit fast fashion for good

We’re caught in a loop: H&M, Forever 21, Target, Zara…Fast fashion is still the default setting for many shoppers. It provides a quick fix that can be hard to break free of, and the hardcore addicts know that the perfect pushback to shut well-meaning friends up is: if we stop buying fast fashion what happens to all the garment workers who depend...

Apr 16, 2019

News

How to convince friends to quit fast fashion for good

We’re caught in a loop: H&M, Forever 21, Target, Zara…Fast fashion is still the default setting for many shoppers. It provides a quick fix that can be hard to break free of, and the hardcore addicts know that the perfect pushback to shut well-meaning friends up is: if we stop buying fast fashion what happens to all the garment workers who depend...

Apr 16, 2019

Fashion

Pop-up Sweatshop urges the Fashion Industry to be more Transparent

Amsterdam - It almost seems unfathomable that a global industry which generated 1.5 trillion euros in revenues last year does not pay a living wage to all its workers. Yet this is the reality for a large majority of the 60 million people employed in the fashion industry supply chain. In countries like Bangladesh, India, and Cambodia, millions of...

May 17, 2017

Business

Uniqlo's Factory Worker Empowerment Project yields first results

Washing our hands with soap, cleaning fruits and vegetables before consumption and making sure water is clean and fit to drink are habits that have become second nature to us. We even teach our children these basics from a young age onward to make sure they remain healthy and happy. But what if this knowledge is missing due to a lack of basic...

Jun 15, 2016