In the wake of the deadly Rana Plaza collapse at Savar in April, a global conference is set to be held on October 14 to formally launch the Garment Industry Transparency Initiative (GITI) to address the issues in Bangladesh’s garments sector.
A six-strong steering committee was formed at a preparatory conference on Thursday in Berlin to consult over the issues and arrange the launching of the initiative. The committee is headed by Nobel laureate Prof Muhammad Yunus, while founder of Transparency International, Prof Peter Eigen, was made co-chair.
The preparatory conference was held at Humboldt-Viadrina School of Governance, convened by the Yunus Centre and the school while a total of 135 representatives from government, NGOs, garments companies, labour associations, academia and others participated in the conference.
Following the model of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative (EITI), the GITI is set to adopt a joint approach which will involve governments, factory owners, labourers, retailers, and the civil society in both producer and consumer countries.
The conference will also work towards an agreement among the involved parties to initiate comprehensive standards on labour conditions.
In his speech, Dr Yunus proposed initiating an international minimum wage for the garment workers in each country.
He also stressed that the compliance issue should not be a subject of any price negotiations. The international buyers would have to accept the compliance issue as a part of the production cost.
