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According to a labor rights group, Asian garment workers have been deprived of nearly $ 12 billion in wages and severance pay as international retailers canceled orders and demanded price reductions in the wake of the pandemic. .
The clean clothing campaign said approximately 1.6 million garment workers had lost their jobs in seven Asian countries, including Bangladesh, India and Myanmar, with many denials of severance pay. Workers in the countries surveyed, with the exception of Indonesia, had lost on average a salary equivalent to two months’ salary or more.
As factories across Asia were closed due to closures or canceled orders, staff were fired or paid only a small percentage of their normal wages, causing major problems for workers in a industry where low wages make savings difficult.
Khalid Mahmood, director of the Pakistan-based Labor Education Foundation, said the layoffs and underpayment of the $ 2.5 million global fashion supply chain “were not just happening in that factory in Bangladesh or Pakistan “.
“It is happening to the entire garment industry [with] garment workers are owed $ 11.85 billion worldwide, ”he added.
Most Western fashion retailers moved clothing production from their home countries to South and Southeast Asia decades ago in search of cheaper labor. This has gone hand in hand with the rise of so-called fast fashion: very cheap clothes that only have to be worn a few times and then can be thrown away.
When pandemic blockades affected Europe and the United States, many of the world’s largest retailers responded demanding strong retroactive discounts or they refused to pay for orders, as they initially feared they would struggle to sell clothes. Revenue fell on some street brands, but many large retailers have returned to profitability as blockages have been reduced.
H&M, the Swedish fashion retailer, said it was aware that the hours of many Asian garment workers had been reduced due to “prevalent blockages around the world and declining customer demand.”
“It is undeniable the need for structural change in several countries producing garments with weak social protection systems,” the company told the Financial Times, noting that during “those unprecedented times it was totally on the side of our responsible purchasing practices “.
Inditex, Spanish owner of the Zara chain, which produces most of its clothes in Morocco, Turkey and Spain, said it had paid in full for all orders that had been produced or were in production when the closure arrived.
He also said he was in favor of unionization and collective bargaining in his supply chain “as a way to promote workers’ rights and fair wages.”
The relationship between international fashion brands and those who sew clothes has long suffered from a power imbalance.
The fall in prices paid for Asian-made garments, which has been evident for years, had been accelerated by the pandemic, said Christie Miedema, campaign coordinator and outreach for the Clean Clothes Campaign.
“The speed with which prices are falling is now due to the crisis. . . many garment factories are in financial difficulties after the cancellation of the order and [are] desperate, ”she said.
The campaign group warned that as coronavirus infection rates continued to rise around the world, the situation for garment workers is likely to worsen. He estimated the loss of wages and jobs in the region based on statements from surveys of employers, industry and workers, as well as media reports.
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