GSP, climate financing sought for adaptation

Bangladesh, the worst sufferer of the climate change, is the world's second largest exporter of apparel products stitched by millions of workers, most of whom are forced migrants owing to river erosion and other natural calamities as an impact of global warming.

The country's apparel industry that arranges livelihoods for major of climate refugees, counts lots as duty to get access to the USA - one of the prime responsible countries for climate damages, as a 15.5 percent duty is imposed on the 'Made in Bangladesh' apparel products for that market while its competitor Vietnam paysonly 5.5 percent.

In this backdrop, development experts suggested for launching an intense diplomatic drive for raising the issue of providing Generalized System of Preference (GSP) to Bangladeshi apparel products to the USA market on the global climate negotiations undertaken by the Biden administration.

Bangladesh's apparel products in the US market have become pricey due to elimination of GSP facility since 2013.

For its much enthusiastic manufacturers and hard-working and skilled workers, the country has maintained its prominence in the US market despite paying huge duty, almost $900 million annually, to get access to the market of the world's richest country and fetched nearly $6 billion during January-December period in 2019 which was $5.40 billion during the corresponding period in 2018.

Between January and December 2019, Bangladesh shipped 2.01 billion square meters of apparel to the US. The figure was 1.93 billion square metres in the previous calendar year, as noted in the latest data.

Under the Joe Biden administration, United States on February 19, 2021 returned to the Paris Climate Accord, while Bangladesh welcomed the decision and appreciated Biden’s commitment to put the US back on a track of net-zero emissions by 2050.

President Biden called a two-day summit on April 22-23, 2021 after returning to  the Paris Climate Agreement from which his predecessor had pulled out. New hopes have been raised following Biden's return to the Paris deal and then hosting the summit ahead of the COP26, to be held in Glasgow in  November.

As the current president of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF) and the Vulnerable Twenty Group (V20), Bangladesh plays a leading role in climate discourse and focuses on the urgent need to strengthen climate action and adaptation efforts by enhancing nationally determined contributions (NDCs).

Bangladesh Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, president of Climate Vulnerable Forum, a grouping of 48 climate vulnerable countries, thanked Biden for convening  the Summit and inviting her to speak to this august gathering. Deeply appreciating the US's return to the Paris deal, she said Bangladesh is keen to engage with the international community.

The PM also suggested pursuing Loss and Damage, a process that refers to the harms caused by anthropogenic climate change within the UN Framework  Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).

Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has put forward four suggestions at the Leaders Summit on Climate, including cutting global emission,  transferring technology and ensuring attainment of the annual target of  mobilising $100 billion as committed by developed countries.

The developed countries had made the commitment to mobilise $100 billion, Green Climate Fund, per year by 2020 for climate actions in the developing countries, but only $30 billion could be mobilised so far.

Stressing the need for the fund, Hasina said it should be balanced 50:50 between  adaptation and mitigation with special attention to vulnerable  communities.

Presently, a major portion of the $30 billion is spent on mitigation projects, whereas the developing countries need adaptation  more than mitigation as they contribute to carbon emissions the least  but are affected more.

"Major economies, international financial institutions and private sectors should come forward for concessional climate financing as well as innovation," the PM said on the first day  of the two-day summit hosted virtually by US President Joe Biden.

Every year, Bangladesh is spending about $5 billion, about 2.5 percent of its GDP, on climate adaptation and resilience-building measures, she said.

The "Made in Bangladesh" apparels have paid a tariff of $894 million in 2018, according to the BGMEA.

The country's apparel makers have been asking the government to negotiate with the US authorities for creating a space for duty-free export facility for those items made from the US cotton.

The government should also provide some incentives for apparel exporters to make them competitive compared to the Vietnamese ones.

According to the BGMEA, cotton products constitute a share of 74.14 percent of the Bangladesh apparel export. Against an increased demand for cotton, import of the item from the USA increased over the last three years. Bangladesh spent about $387 million on cotton import from the USA in 2018.

Meanwhile, apparel workers who were affected at Rana Plaza accident in 2013did not get proper compensations as international brands and buyers have been reluctant to pay the victims and their families. 

The domestic owners have more or less paid compensation, but most of the promises made by international organizations, including brands and buyers, seem unrealistic, said Nasimul Ahsan, a development and workers' rights worker.

The accident at Rana Plaza in our country was a huge blow to the expansion of our country's industry. At the same time it gave a strong enough shock to the outside world and then it became clear how insecurely this industry has been growing in our country and how this industry was expanding without following the law or safety regulations. As a result, a number of deadly incidents have taken place in our country before but we have not been able to learn from them. We had to come to Rana Plaza Tragedy at the cost of the lives of about 1200 workers. 

Two things are clear here. The way our domestic industry was expanding, industrial law, labor law and safety issues were not given due attention. And the buyers who came from the international market and placed orders here also did not do responsible sourcing, did not buy the goods responsibly. That's why they used to make contract with random factory so that they could finish their work quickly and start working again in the next season.

Asked what role our media could play in presenting workers' demands to international brands and organizations for compensating workers, Nasimul Ahsan said: "My attitude towards media is different. In other words, most of the people who have worked in the media are our friendly professionals. From the very beginning, the media had a surveillance role in reporting and following up on other incidents, including Rana Plaza. We have also seen the helpless life stories of the affected workers coming up through the media at different times. I will call it the inner side of the media. But one thing I see missing in this case is that the media did not adequately cover the promises made to compensate the brand and the buyers."

"At that time those companies who were working here or who were producing in this Rana Plaza said we will stand by the affected families, we will see these affected families so that they do not become helpless but later they did not see them anymore. In the case of Rana Plaza, various missteps have been done, for example, NGOs have been employed here, various non-responsible organizations have been employed here, sewing training with sewing machines has been provided by various NGOs and tried to get the work done irresponsibly. But this issue should never have done by any NGO. The task was to be entrusted to various trade unions, BGMEA and those international brands that bought and sold a variety of garments from here in the international market," he added.

They then promised that we would stand by the families of these workers and arrange for their compensation. But we later saw that they did not keep their promise but took away the GSP facility we had. 

"Our media did not report on those issues properly. Our journalist friends and media personnel can still report on the matter if they wish and play a role in ensuring that compensation will be paid," he further said.

On the occasion of the 8th of the Rana Plaza collapse tragedy day, The Bangladesh News organised a virtual talk show known as TBN Fact Finding. Golam Shahnee, Executive Editor of The Bangladesh News was the moderator and Jamal Uddin, Business Editor of Daily Ittefaq, Ibrahim Hossain Ovi, chief reporter of Business Post and Nasimul Ahsan, Development Activist participated in the programme.

Jamal Uddin said, in context of Bangladesh, as far as we have advanced in the garments sector, we are lagging behind in terms of safety. As you can see, the owners of the garments always put their interests first. Even during this global pandemic you will see they have left the factory open to pursue their interests. This is like the livelihood of garment owners before the life of the garment workers. Even if the workers are pushed to the brink of death, they have to hold on to their business. How much a worker has been able to secure his basic right to life is a big question in the face of the demands of these garment owners.

Secondly, Rana Plaza has shown us how insecure the Bangladeshi workers were in the factory. Even now many workers are working in many factories in Bangladesh due to insecurity. Bangladesh has all kinds of laws but the law is not always enforced and the agencies responsible for monitoring them do not fulfill their responsibilities properly.

Thirdly, you can say that the policy makers of Bangladesh make laws on behalf of the businessmen of the country. You may have noticed in recent times that many have said that the media is also indifferent to these workers. I think the media also has a big role to play in this place and these entire garment owners need to be active from the place of social responsibility. Because satisfied labors means better productivity and better production leads towards the development of the country. That is why we all have to be active now.

Ibrahim Hossain Ovi, "If we look at our economy, we can see that the garment industry is contributing to a large part of our economy. But the collapse of the RMG sector in 2013 called into question the safety of Bangladeshi workers around the world. In other words, how safe is this industry for those who work day after day and enriched our garment industries so far? If we want to explain the reason, we must first say that there was enough weakness of trade union or collective bargaining to raise the voice of the workers. As a result, the workers could not raise their voices for which they were forced to work. As a result, we have had to pay the price for so many lives. If we talk about May Day, we can see a merely number of workers died and May Day is celebrated all over the world. I think such a big accident in Bangladesh should be the first and last for our country and it should be declared as Safety Day at work. The progress we have seen in the garment sector since 2013 has been only in exchange for the blood of the workers. Global brands, buyers and donor agencies are now working to improve our security. They act as a kind of push factor here and with the financial support they have brought to today's position, the issue of our labor security is at least somewhat satisfactory. The question now is whether we can sustain the progress we have made. If we cannot sustain this progress, we will not be able to avoid such accidents in the future. Now we need monitoring to sustain this improvement."

"Asked how much the owners are giving importance to the trade union issues and how much the overall industry is improving and how the owners can take the industry forward with the help of the trade unions, the interests of the workers can be protected at the same time, said Ibrahim Hossain Abhi.  If workers work in a friendly environment, the productivity of the industry and interest in working will increase. That is why at present the owners are giving importance to social discussion," he added.