Western retailers urge Bangladesh Prime Minister to address labour issues

Published in the Daily Star on 9, August 2017

The Foreign Trade Association, a Brussels-based organisation of global retailers, sent a letter to Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina urging her to settle the outstanding labour issues in the country.

“The European Union, Bangladesh’s largest trading partner, is highly concerned about the respect of fundamental human and labour rights in your country,” said the letter that was sent to the prime minister last month.

The EU is, therefore, considering an investigation to evaluate if the conditions for Bangladesh to obtain benefits under the Generalised Scheme of Preferences are still met.

“This could ultimately result in the possible withdrawal of the benefits of the Everything but Arms scheme,” said the FTA, which represents more than 2,000 retailers whose combined annual turnover exceeds $1 trillion.

The FTA also mentioned the concern of the partners of the Sustainability Compact and the International Labour Organisation.

The Sustainability Compact partners and the ILO urged the government to develop a clear strategy to effectively enforce the respect of labour rights, in particular the freedom of association and the right to collective bargaining, and to set a deadline for completion of the process to allow trade unions in the export processing zones.

At present, workers in EPZs enjoy trade union facilities under the Workers’ Welfare Association in line with the Bangladesh EPZ Act, but the Compact partners wanted trade unions to be formed in line with the Bangladesh Labour Act, the letter said.

The pressure from the EU, ILO and other international bodies regarding the labour issues and extension of the tenure of the Accord without mutual consent as well as the latest boiler explosion have an impact on the reputation of Bangladesh.

“Many of our members are currently finalising their annual budget planning and need to decide about their future sourcing strategy,” the FTA said.

In light of this, the FTA has been mandated by its members to seek clarification from the government about its response to the official request made by the European Commission, the letter read.  Bangladesh is an increasingly important sourcing market for the FTA members who buy in volumes from more than 2,200 Bangladeshi producers, making it the third most important sourcing hub for them.