Introduction
The global fashion industry is hugely important to large retailers like H&M because it helps determine wages and employment in their supply chains. This essay reflects deeply into the nature of payment standardization and the way of life of labour dealing with retail trade, also unwrapping complexities affecting the entire industry of clothes making in the eyes of the ethical doctrine, to examine the roles of unions, consumers and suppliers. This essay deeply examines H&M’s standards and the broader significance of the situation for producing goods and consumers. This essay aims to bring the problems and opportunities concerning fair wages, safe working conditions, and ethical procurement into light in the fashion supply chain.
The material wage question on supply chain apparel presents a complicated situation suggesting that the existing corporate rhetoric and practices have a significant gap. According to the spokesperson for H&M, Lucy Siegle (2013), argues that supporting workers’ demand for higher wages is crucial for employers such as H&M. We thus want to ensure that every worker in our supply chain gets a chance to make a living by his/her wages. Nonetheless, the speaker’s later assertion disproves this argument: “Since we don’t own any factories. Therefore, we do not set and pay the textile workers’ wages” Following up on this by asking about the extent to which more powerful retailers like H&M must, in the last instance, take responsibility to guarantee that human rights are well respected throughout their supply chain.
Multinational corporations (MNCs) tend to offshore to countries with relaxed labour regulations and nonexistent enforcement, making it possible for them to exploit cheap labour and poor working conditions. The case of the garment industry in Bangladesh, the second-largest exporter of clothing in the world, illustrates the severe consequences of these poor working conditions (Barua et al., 2018:77-78). Individuals were not to be kept from buying food and medical services since these were exempted. These individuals are physically maltreated, racially discriminated against and receive a below-poverty-line paycheck, even when retailers have publically promised to treat workers fairly and to improve the working conditions. This conflict between the sustaining rhetoric and the wages paid to workers, which is one of the problematic issues and complexities, clearly shows that it is, indeed, one of the problematic issues.
H&M advocates for a dialogue between managers and workers through shared platforms. Moreover, what function and place are the trade unions taking in this debate? Unions function as the middleman between the workers and the management. Therefore, they can do the work on behalf of the workers and negotiate for higher wages and better working conditions. On the contrary, garment workers unions in some other countries face problems of not being allowed to organize, harassment, and not having legal support. For instance, in the case of ready-made garments in Bangladesh, the second largest exporter in the world, the necessity of unions being the workers’ representative for human rights and decent wages and conditions is undoubtedly true.
Unions are a familiar force that can fight the intensity of ILO and MNCs like H&M by starting negotiations for equity, safe working conditions and workers’ rights. Besides, the effectiveness of fairness dialogue is likely to be undermined if unions cannot work openly and campaign for workers without fearing retaliation, harassment and discrimination.
H&M, over time, advocates that business sustainability and stability are the first and foremost priorities. Dialogue between employers and employees is the first and foremost tool for achieving them. At the centre of their faith stands the acceptability of the underlying rules of freedom of association and social dialogue, a pillar of their Code of Conduct. The code determines that every employee, whether a prime member or not, can freely join any union and be entitled to collective bargaining. H&M makes it very clear that it will not tolerate any actions by the Employers that could be against the employees who demand their right to unionize or join a union. This, therefore, signifies that H&M is committed to offering workers an arrangement where they can democratically exercise their bargaining power to champion their rights. Therefore, the organization develops a work setting with free and equal employee interaction.
Furthermore, H&M’s unionization and collective bargaining principles are also supported by the Index Code of Conduct (ICoC index), which measures and rewards good practices in factories and suppliers. This scoring system, therefore, incentivizes unions to be formed within the factories as higher ICoC scores are granted to those plants in which members of active union centres are present. As a result, in 2011, the activities of H&M in Bangladesh became the most illustrative of the chain of communication and dialogue. H&M selected five establishments to demonstrate the essence of democratic participation of workers, and the campaign was organized to make the relationship between workers and managers more cooperative with the help of the experts and the creation of more than 140 improvement circles that were participated by 2,500 workers the organization aimed to unify the workforce. Such meetings allowed the workers to speak on critical issues about working conditions, including pay, leave and safety at the workplace.
The code by H&M Is very transparent in terms of the brand’s Supplier Code of Conduct, which clearly outlines the brand’s expectations of its partners. However, the real question is whether they effectively enhance working conditions and wage levels for the garment supply chain. The primary factor of the regulation that ought to be monitored and enforced using several stakeholders in the supply chain, which could be more organized, is the complexity of monitoring and enforcing the regulation.
The H&M brand has been responsible for underpaying employees by retaining wages below the minimum, long working hours, and abusive conditions of work in some factories that are producing for H&M. Following the example of Levi’s, a massive clothing brand, which has been forced to sign an International Treaty for Workers’ Health and Safety in both Bangladesh and Pakistan, the other clothing brands should undertake the same measures. Critics, from activists to workers, have raised the point that audits from Levi’s are inefficient and its workers are not widely protected, so they are asking for an international agreement, which can be used as a more thorough framework to address workers’ health and safety issues. The lack of workers’ participation in decision-making processes by the private audit programs is a major flaw that has been widely pointed out as the primary weakness.
As a powerful force in the fashion and garment industry, consumers can change the way working conditions and ethical sourcing are assessed. Consumer ethics come to the forefront as ethical consumerism spreads, and consumers are eager to find more ethical products and expect the companies to be responsible. They have created a market niche for brands that take ethics and fairness in their supply chains seriously and have prospered. Brands such as Levi’s and the Guardian’s campaigns and advocacy programs show that consumer awareness and activism drive the battle for ethics and sustainability in branding.
However, pressure from buyers can even make brands choose to go ethically out of ethical practices, although this has limitations. Consumers know they mainly do not possess authentic and trustworthy information about the brand’s supply chain, so they cannot decide when buying products. Not only is moral fashion even more expensive and therefore only accessible to a smaller portion of the population, but it can also be hard to find. Therefore, dealing with such shares has been quite difficult for the industry. However, the consumers’ demand for transparency and ethics is getting into the industry and thus guiding it to a more responsible and sustainable future.
Conclusion
Last year, the sewing industry in Bangladesh made great progress in workplace safety and conditions ten years after the Rana Plaza Accident. Moreover, the accident of the Rana Plaza that involved the government of Bangladesh and the private sector-led mission meant the assessment of 3,780 factories, stipulating the structural, electrical and fire safety. The policy and the plan of action were therefore developed and introduced. Nevertheless, they are imperfect, and these obstacles continue to exist. The sector other than the garment industry is also affected by industrial safety as it has been up in recent accidents, such as the Seema Oxygen Plant explosion in March 2023 (International Labour Organizations, 2023).
Finally, H&M, the most famous clothing retailer in the world, has set up several standards and a Code of Conduct to make sure that their suppliers pay their workers fairly and offer them safe working conditions. However, H&M, despite its corporate commitments, H&M is still seen by many as a company with deplorable working conditions, especially in countries such as Bangladesh. However, the company highlights discussions and unionization as the answer to the dilemma. If these are insufficient, the company’s workers will not get the fair treatment they deserve, and the union will not be successful in its representation.
Bibliography
Barua, S., Kar, D. and Mahbub, F.B., 2018. Risks and their management in the ready-made garment industry: Evidence from the world’s second-largest exporting nation. Barua S., Kar D., & Mahbub FB (2018). Risks and their management in ready-made garment industry: Evidence from the world’s second largest exporting nation. Journal of Business and Management, 24(2), pp.75-99.
International Labour Organizations (2023). The Rana Plaza disaster ten years on What has changed? https://www.ilo.org/infostories/en-GB
Lucy Siegle, (2013). The Guardian organization. Https://www.theguardian.com/profile/lucysiegle
Michael-sainato, MS (2022). The Guardian organization. Https://www.theguardian.com/profile/michael-sainato
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