The boards of Bangladesh’s newest safety monitoring initiative Nirapon and the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association BGMEA and representatives of the BKMEA met to continue the conversation on their shared goal to protect the safety of RMG factory workers in Bangladesh.
The two bodies have revealed they met at the end of September.
A Nirapon spokesperson said: “All parties committed to engage in an ongoing, constructive dialogue in order to ensure continued partnership.
“The target is to support a unified and sustainable approach to safety at the national level in order to sustain the significant progress made so far.
“In the meantime, Nirapon will continue operations while it simultaneously explores how best to support collaboration with the national safety initiative.”
The target, the groups say, is to support a unified and sustainable approach to safety at a national level in order to sustain the significant progress made so far.
In the meantime, Nirapon says it will continue its operations while it simultaneously explores how best to support collaboration with the national safety initiative.
Launched in March, Nirapon is a voluntary programme tasked with overseeing the ongoing safety, training and helpline efforts in Bangladesh’s RMG factories.
It is backed by more than 20 brands and retailers, including The Children’s Place, Walmart, VF Corp, Nordstrom, Target, Macy’s, JC Penney, Gap Inc, Abercrombie & Fitch, and Li & Fung.
According to the strategic sourcing tool, the textile and apparel sector contributes around 20% to Bangladesh’s GDP. It employs around 20m people in the country and is the major driving force of the country’s economy. Some 8% of world apparel exports come from Bangladesh.
The Alliance was set up to represent US brands on worker safety in Bangladesh following the Rana Plaza disaster in which 1,134 people lost their lives in 2013. It operates in parallel to the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh, set up by European brands, which is due to hand over its duties to a new body, the Readymade Sustainability Council (RSC), next year.
Questions have been asked by workers’ rights groups and NGOs, including Labour Behind the Labour and the Clean Clothes Campaign, over whether the RSC will be sufficiently robust to take on responsibility for workplace safety.
About Nirapon:Nirapon focuses on building capacity amongst Bangladesh’s assessment and training service providers. It tries to accomplish this by identifying service providers capable of supporting assessments, remediation, capacity building and training. Factories manufacturing for Nirapon member brands engage assessment and training service providers from the qualified pool, while Nirapon validates the quality of services provided and alert members to any potential risk and issues.
