Workers unrest in RMG sector and steps to dissolve it.
Bangladesh is a LDC country. Most of the people of this country are poor. Majority of this poor community come from a rural area and now engaged with ready-made garments industry as a worker. According to a source, there are 2.2 million people are now working for ready-made garments industry, and more then 80% of them are female worker. Bangladesh earns billion $ by exporting readymade goods each year.
Especially the USA and the EEC is main consumer of our readymade garments products. After the MFA second phase-out Bangladesh entered in a competitive environment, and now Bangladesh has to competition with other rmg export country like India, China, Vietnam.
Only the low labor cost is the main key by how Bangladesh is staying in this competition. We learned from recent news that Vietnam overtakes Bangladesh as 2nd biggest apparels supplier to US. So it would be difficult to stay in competition with depending only one factor.
Worker unrest, bad working condition makes difficult to export the rmg goods in US market. Moreover last year due to climate change in Europe the target-sell couldn’t fill up which resulting low earning. Although, political instability, high rate of bank loan, high rate of value add makes the industry frustrated and recent workers unrest add a new status to this industry.
But the worker unrest is not a sudden event in readymade garments industry. Some special causes are behind for these unrests. When long time discrimination reached in an extreme situation then a revolution unfolds and creates unrest and most unrest becomes violet for certain reasons. From the January’2008 up to September there are 33-worker unrest event in rmg industry. Each of the unrest has centralized by the questions of wages and due payment.
In an EPR situation, ban of political activity, ban of trade union activity and at that time such unrest events indicates only one cause and that is the low wages. But the government and the BGMEA couldn’t view the exact point. A research paper published that Indian workers employed in the garment-manufacturing sector get the highest wage, while Bangladeshi workers are at the bottom of the heap among South Asians.
Bangladesh Government had announced new labor act at 2006-named labor law-2006. A new minimum wages has fixed at taka 1665.00 instead of 930.00 what had been continued since 1993. But the point is how logical the new minimum wages with the present price hiking? What is the status of garments industry on implementing the new labor law? What is the improvement to implementing the minimum wages?
Then is there any monitoring result on implementing new tripartite agreement?
Now this the time to work together of all parties who are related with this industry to dissolved the problem. But the present suffering would not be ended in sudden. It attentions a long-term program. For this both the government, entrepreneurs and the workers should be realistic for this.
Government should do the followings steps-
a) To monitor about the implementation and its advance ness of the labor law, implementation of minimum wages and continuous of increasing of the wages with considering the present market prices.
b) Implementing of tripartite agreement.
c) With efficient discussions to increase the price of products and in order to do that some training program could through among the negotiators and the entrepreneurs.
d) Decrease the bank interest and all kinds of taxes related with importing of any raw materials or machinery for rmg industry.
e) Good governances.
Along this the owners should be respectable to the workers rights. They should be pay the wages to the workers in time, should be good behaved with the workers inside the factory, and must be paid all mandatory benefit to the female workers. The owners should be understand that dictatorship and application of forces never anonyms of art.
At the same time the workers organizations have to work to maintain their objects and goal. They should be aware to the workers about their rights and duty. They should be take care to implementing the labor law where it needs to arise. They should be remember that ransacked
Or damaging property never brings sympathy and it never helps to protect workers rights.
