About 55 per cent of high-priority repairs and 63 per cent of all required repairs of Bangladesh’s garment factories affiliated with the Alliance for Bangladesh Worker Safety have been completed so far. Alliance is a platform of North American apparel buyers and companies.

All Alliance factories are expected to complete their high-priority repairs by July 2018. Alliance has warned of cutting relationships with those factories which fail to make progress on repairs that address safety concerns. Those unwilling or unable to comply will be suspended and removed from the compliant factory list.

Meanwhile Alliance has suspended 104 factories for failure to make progress on repairs that address safety concerns till October 12, 2016. Critical repairs include lightning protection systems on buildings, exit enclosures provided with rated, fire-resistant barriers, easy means of egress, strong structural columns that can support the weight of the factory structure, machinery, and workers, and structural systems free of distress, settlement, shifting, or cracking in columns or walls.

Alliance is working with factories to prioritize the most critical repairs. Some issues including the import and installation of fire doors, the reinforcement of structural beams and columns, and the installation of sprinkler systems are often costly and time-consuming for factories to achieve.