Write – a one-page analysis of the article in your unit reading assignment by – – Nick Cook – titled, -Rana Plaza Revisited: Following the Deaths of Over a – – Thousand Bangladeshi Garment – Workers When a Factory Building Collapsed in – 2013, – Western Retailers Were Forced – to Take Action to Improve Health and – Safety. Be – sure to include your thoughts on what happened and how you might have – – handled – things differently from an HR perspective. Cite all sources (which at – a – minimum – should be this article) and references in APA format, and include a – – title page, – body to analyze the article, and conclusion section.

In April 2013, the Rana Plaza building in Bangladesh collapsed, a disaster that killed 1,134 garment workers and injured 2,500 more. The immediate cause of the disaster was the overloading of two (illegal) upper storeys of a weak building with 3,500 workers, thousands of industrial sewing machines and two power generators. Thin floors and the addition of too much sand to the concrete used to construct the building also contributed to the eight-storey collapse.

But the soil nurturing the seeds of this disaster was the economic and political system in which the garment industry grew. The ready-made garment (RMG) industry accounts for 80 per cent of Bangladesh’s export earnings and depends on a ready supply of the cheapest labour in the world often crammed into factories which can be all too often unstable and full of fire hazards.

Overwhelmingly, these factories are owned

not by the brand names and retailers in western countries but by local factory owners, whose influence with the government mitigates against effective health and safety enforcement. And the fact that the industry’s workforce, approximately 3.5 million workers, is largely female and not well-educated makes it easier to dominate. On-the morning of collapse in 2013, the building was showing signs that it was unsafe but workers were bullied into entering it. There were no unions to stand up to them.

Pressures on local factory owners in Bangladesh add to the problems. Not only do they struggle to compete with each other but also with RMG factories in other countries such as China. To succeed they must meet the tight prices and even tighter deadlines demanded by western brands and retailers. The firms working on the unsafe floors of Rana Plaza supplied well-known brands and retailers in Europe and the USA. These included Primark (UK), Matalan (UK), Bon Marche (UK) Mango (Spain) Joe Fish

Working Life

“ Major life-threatening safety concerns remain outstanding in too many factories.”

(Canada) and Benetton (Italy).

Given the economic importance of the ready-made garment industry to the Bangladesh economy, it is not surprising that government officials turn a blind eye as manufacturers cut corners to meet these demands. But tragically, many of those cut corners are health and safety corners.

Nor are poorly made buildings the only problem. Fires are frequent and deadly. Just five months before the Rana Plaza disaster, a factory fire killed at least 111 people. In 2013, the same year as Rana Plaza, it is estimated that (largely unreported) fires in garment and textile factories killed

Following the deaths of over a thousand Bangladeshi garment workers when a factory building collapsed in 2013, western retailers were forced to take action to improve health and safety. Nick Cook discusses what progress had been made.