Zara and H&M might be forced to cease sourcing from Bangladesh

Fast fashion brands might need to stop sourcing from Bangladesh.
Watchdog group that has been working to improve Bangladesh garment
factories could close as soon as next week. After the tragic Rana
Plaza disaster in 2013 in which over 1,100 garment workers were
killed, a five-year accord was put in place to improve working
conditions in Bangladesh’s factories.

Called the Accord on Fire and Building Safety, over 200 global
firms and retailers including H&M and Zara signed the Accord. Since
the disaster five years ago, the Accord has inspected over two
thousand factories and comprised a detailed plan to repair over 150
thousand structural and safety concerns.

However, a complaint was recently made by a factory owner and the
Bangladeshi High Court has now ordered the Accord on Fire and Building
Safety to close its Dhaka office. The complaining factory owner had
been accused by the group of falsifying test results on the strength
of his factory’s structure. “The premature shut down of the Accord,
leaving workers in unsafe circumstances, would jeopardize the brands’
ability to source from a safe industry,” the Accord’s deputy director
Joris Oldenziel told Reuters.

The group has been lobbying the government to lift the court order.
If nothing changes, the Accord will continue to operate from the
Netherlands, and the companies who have signed it will still be
legally bound. The signatories would no longer be able to source from
hundreds of Bangladeshi factories with safety issues if the Accord can
no longer monitor inspections. This would mean that fast fashion
brands like Zara and H&M who use these factories due to the low wages
in the area would have to find new sourcing solutions.