Monday, January 15, 2018

Educating Sweated Labour

In Australia, discount department stores are selling school uniforms and Oxfam Australia alleges the women making them are being paid poverty wages. 

Oxfam labour rights manager Joy Kyriacou alleged underpayment by the clothing sector is a serious issue.
“The women in Asia making clothes for these household name Australian brands are trapped in poverty by pittance wages – often left with no other choice but to live in slums, in some cases separated from their children – and struggling to provide the essentials for their families,” Kyriacou said.
Research showed that on average, just four per cent of the price of a piece of clothing sold in Australia goes towards workers’ wages in garment factories across Asia. In Bangladesh – where wages are extremely low – an average of just two per cent of the price of an item of clothing sold in Australia goes to factory workers’ wages.
“This means that for a $5 school polo top made in Bangladesh, an average of just 10 cents is paid to the factory workers who made it,” Kyriacou said. “But the research also estimated that if the price of clothing was increased by just one per cent – just five cents for a $5 school shirt – brands could afford to pay a living wage. Oxfam believes with the profits being made by factory owners, wholesalers, and retailers in the fashion industry, the cost of paying workers a living wage can realistically be absorbed in fashion supply chains.”
Machine operator in a Dhaka factory,  Nahida had dreams of studying and becoming a doctor, but her family was entrenched in poverty and she told Oxfam she had to leave school at age 13 to work in the garment industry. Today, Nahida works six days a week and earns as little as $115 a month. 

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