Case Study : F Shoring Of Garment Industry

A majority of the clothing worn and purchased today in the United States has been manufactured overseas in sweatshops. Since the beginning of factories and businesses, owners have always looked for a way to cut production costs while still managing to produce large quantities of their product. It was found that the best way to cut costs was to utilize cheap labor in factories known as sweatshops. According to the US General Account Office, sweatshops are defined as a “business that regularly violates both wage or child labor and safety or health laws”. These sweatshops exploit their workers in various ways: making them work long hours in dangerous working conditions for little to no pay. Personally, I believe that the come up and employment of these sweatshops is unethical, but through my research I plan to find out if these shops produce more positive than negatives by giving these people in need a job despite the rough conditions.

• The enormous surplus of labor in China imperils workers worldwide as international competition puts incessant downward pressure on wages and working conditions, leading the apparel and textile industries to favor the cheapest and most Draconian producers.

Bangladesh is one of the world 's most densely populated countries, with its people crammed into a delta of rivers that empties into the Bay of Bengal (BBC, 2015). Poverty is widespread, where many people suffer from malnutrition, especially in the rural areas. The structural failure of the Rana Plaza collapse, an eight-story commercial building, occurred on 24 April 2013 in the Savar Upazila of Dhaka, Bangladesh. This resulted in 1,137 confirmed dead at Rana Plaza, and over a year later 200 are still missing (Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights, 2015). The issue is an ethical issue which has affected many lives in Bangladesh and resulted in western civilisation demanding change. The ethical issue involves around a Bangladesh man Sohel Rana, and western clothing companies, specifically the company it manufactured for, Canadian fashion brand Joe Fresh (Forbes, 2013). The building, Rana Plaza, was owned by Sohel Rana, whom illegally extended the six-storey building, into a nine-storey factory complex.

The introductory of the documentary examines the fabric mills of Bangladesh. It is very competitive in the international market place to find low cost labor; when merchandise manufactured in another country is imported these country put on a duty rate. Apparel companies contemplating low cost labor,

Although the Chinese apparel manufacturers would lose profitability due to rising cotton prices and competition from emerging countries, they stand to gain the most from the removal of U.S. quotas and tariffs. According to the author, in 2007, 95% of the 20 billion garments Americans made were purchased overseas. Due to U.S. trade barriers, China’s share of the U.S. apparel import was only 30%. Once these barriers were removed, Chinese apparel would flood the American market due to their low cost and dominance in garment manufacturing. Experts predict that China could eventually supply 85% of U.S. apparel. As they increase their market share in the

Of the many solutions to the problem, the main, and most obvious solution, is government regulation. The Department of Labor monitors the garment industry, but with 800 inspectors for 22,000 garment contractors, in addition to 6 million American

I don't think boycotting garments made in Bangladesh will solve the problem. A boycott of garments from Bangladesh would increase unemployment, considering the dependency of the country, and its people in garment manufacturing industry. This could result in an increase in the poverty level of the country. Bearing in mind all the stakeholders, it may be advisable to increase the safety, hygienic and compliance standards of these factories avoid disasters like the fire accident.

Part of the reason for China’s massive jump into the global market comes from their lenient policies on labor, placing emphasis far more on production oppose to the safety of workers and the environment. However, even though the Chinese may have unsafe labor conditions and long hours, they still appreciate manufacturing jobs as they are both easier and pay better than the alternative farm labor. Additionally, due to the Chinese communist political system, Chinese citizens are given far less freedom than we in the western world are accustomed to. The manufacturing jobs place them closer to cities where there are more opportunities and job security for their families. Now more so than ever, due to growth in the Chinese economic market there are more choices in the textile market. Competition forces companies to improve wages and working conditions in order to maintain a workforce, which in turn causes lasting and positive change in the rapidly industrializing country. Although the domestic production of t-shirts would create more jobs for American citizens, the US labor force is unwilling to work for wages low enough to sustain the current textile market. Producing t-shirts in China allows the US consumer to enjoy lower prices, while creating economic growth

Bangladesh is considered to be among the worst locations of sweatshops with “…more than 4,800 factories and 3.5 million people employed in the… garment industry, producing cheap clothes under appalling working conditions for major international brands” (War on Want, 2016). This issue involves women, men and children, however it impacts women the most as “women account for 85% of the textile work force and are particularly vulnerable to discrimination and abuse” (War on Want, 2016).

2. Richard M. Johns (2006). The Apparel Industry. 2nd ed. UK, London: Blackwell Publishing Ltd.. 1-124.

Going back to the collapsing of the Rana Plaza, Prashad reveals that there appears to be a trend of factory buildings collapsing in the twenty-first century, specifically "poorly built shelters for a production process geared toward long working days, third rate machines, and workers

In This paper I will cover how ethics morals and laws impact the people in the supply chain of making clothing. I will cover how the introduction of labor unions has impacted the working conditions and the lives of the workers in the garment making industry. I will also go over what you as a consumer can do to ensure that the products you buy are not adding to the problem.

Look at the clothing tag on your shirt. Where was it made? Most likely, the shirt was manufactured outside of the United States. This can be explained by two words. Global outsourcing. Global outsourcing has been a hot topic concerning many Americans since the early 1990’s. Businesses are always deciding whether or not to take on this great challenge. This trend can be seen in the textile and apparel industry, companies have moved mass amounts of production overseas. Although it seems all companies in the textile and apparel industry are transferring their production to other countries, it is not essential for a business to outsource in order to be competitive. Throughout the history of outsourcing, arguments both for

Many large companies, especially in the clothing industry, rely on oversea sweatshops as their primary source of production. The term sweatshop is used to describe a factory that violates two or more laws regarding labor. In many developing countries, these workers are subject to terrible working conditions, low wage, child labour, unreasonable hours and a lack of benefits. Sweatshops are utilised due to the cheap labor and production by a number of companies like Zara, Kmart, Cotton On and Target. Despite a number of incidents involving factory fires, collapse and faulty/malfunctioning equipment killing hundreds at a time, workers continue to face these horrendous conditions and treatment. This is a social justice issue as wealthy companies take advantage of the desperation and vulnerability of those living in poverty. This results in unequal wealth, unfair and immoral treatment of poor people, especially women who make up 85% of the workforce and children, for which there are over 250 million aged 5-14 in the industry. For many, their hourly wage is less than a dollar, with many not being payed at.

In order to investigate how a company’s can maneuver though present situations it is important to map critical incidents in its past. Historically, the country in which Footwear International resides, Bangladesh, has seen major political upheaval in a short period of time. In the 1940s the government transitioned to British-ruled to that of a providence of Pakistan called East Pakistan. Due to political unrest, in the early 1970s power transferred again, thanks to the help of India, where they gained independence and became known as the country of Bangladesh (Lane, Distaefano, & Maznevski, 2006).