The government of Bangladesh has set April 2018 as the deadline for completing remediation works in readymade garment factories inspected under the joint initiative of Bangladesh government and the International Labour Organisation. The Department of Inspection for Factories and Establishments (DIFE) recently started holding meetings with factory owners on evaluation progress and demanded a removal of all the safety faults in their units by April 2018.
DIFE inspector general Md Shamsuzzaman Bhuiyan said, they are holding meetings with the factories housed in their own buildings to evaluate remediation progress and the factory authorities have been asked to complete remediation by April 2018. He threatened owners if any factory inspected under ILO supported national initiative failed to fix all faults by the set deadline, they would have to face legal action. He further announced the DIFE would not permit renewal of licence for noncompliant RMG units after the deadline.
As per DIFE statistics, around 1,549 garment factories, which remained outside the purview of the inspection conducted by two buyers’ groups Accords and Alliance had been inspected under the national initiative. Post completion of initial inspection in November 2015, factories registered about 20 per cent progress in remediation in last two years.
DIFE inspector general said of the 1,590 factories, inspected under the national initiative, 513 have been closed, 64 relocated to new buildings, 14 located in economic zone areas and 178 factories added to the list of global buyers’ platform — Accord and Alliance. Currently they are monitoring remediation work in 780 factories under the government initiative. Of these 312 factories are housed in their own buildings while 468 housed in shared and rented buildings. The labour ministry would convene a meeting of National Tripartite Committee to discuss ways to punish non-compliant factories post the remediation deadline.
