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Last October, during the second Venice Sustainable Fashion Forum, it emerged that workers in the fashion textile sector who receive an adequate wage to support themselves in their own country are 1.5 million out of 75 million, less than 2% of the total. In the tortuous path towards a higher level of environmental and social sustainability of fashion and luxury companies, the question of working conditions and remuneration of workers is one of the most difficult issues to resolve. Because it requires in-depth control (and investments) over the entire supply chain. An issue that businesses will have to address very soon. Also to comply with the new rules arriving from Brussels.
The watershed: the collapse of Rana Plaza
Almost 11 years have passed since the Rana Plaza disaster, the collapse of a factory on the outskirts of Dacca, the capital of Bangladesh, in which 1,138 women employed in the production of clothes for Western fashion brands lost their lives. The accident has brought about some important changes in terms of safety and workers’ rights on site, but there is still a long way to go: according to the Clean Clothes Campaign, working days continue to include between 10 and 18 working hours and for Human Rights Watch after Rana Plaza there were 109 collapses of manufacturing buildings.
Salary conditions often do not allow a dignified life. This is told to us, among others, by the protests that in November 2023 involved workers in Bangladesh, who took to the streets because the wage decided by the local government (subsequently raised to 113 dollars) was lower than the minimum wage estimated to live with dignity. in the country (around 200 euros). Bangladesh is the second largest clothing producer in the world after China, with 3,500 factories and 4 million employees. Who work mainly for Western and fast fashion brands. And this raises a specific issue: control of the supply chain by brands.
A fundamental theme, regardless of where production is located: «The impoverishment of workers, and also of manufacturing companies, arises from an imbalance in the balance of power in the supply chain – explains Deborah Lucchetti, coordinator of the Clean Dresses for Italy campaign – . Sometimes the prices imposed by brands are so low that they do not allow suppliers to respect the rules of the code of ethics that Vale has signed both in Asia and in Italy, where it is true that many productions have been reported, but sometimes it is not clear to which prices and conditions”.
Brand actions in sustainability reports
Brands are attempting to account to consumers and investors for their environmental and social impact through sustainability reporting. Among the fast fashion giants, H&M has been publishing an (accessible) list of its suppliers since 2013 (605 commercial entities with 1,183 manufacturing factories) and recognizes the presence of forced labor as one of the problems in its production chain; Inditex, which in 2022 relied on 1,729 suppliers with 8,271 factories, of which 4,458 were in Asia, conducted almost 10,800 audits in the same year. 690 of these had a negative outcome (non-compliant) and the Inditex report highlights how in Asia the factories that respect the standards of the group’s Code of Conduct on wages are less than 50 percent.