Friday 9 January 2009

The Price of Being Fashionable



"Workers in India, China and Bangladesh get paid enough money for the society that they live in."
This is our defence for our addiction to cheap clothes, even though the monthly wage in Bangladesh is around £7, and living costs for a month are estimated at £30.
Overseas workers who manufacture clothing for companies like Primark, Bay, DKNY, Jigsaw, Tierack and Matalan are being exploited and denied their basic labour rights. Workers are crammed into stifling hot sweatshops and forced to work gruelling hours for next to nothing. Last year, two young girls even stuffed a note into the back pocket of a pair of jeans in a desperate attempt to be rescued from their sorry situation. But, as consumers we still buy from Primark, choosing to have five cheap pairs of shoes rather than one ethically made pair.
Suprisingly YSL, Gucci, Ralph Lauren and Armani are even more companies that are listed as having no code of conduct. There are currently very few retailers that have moved implementations of basic workers/human rights in factories and operate on sustainable development principles. Although it has become clear that actually having a code of conduct and an ethical spokesperson is no insurance against it being breached, repeatedly. There is no doubt that this is a complex issue, but its complexity should not make it immune from the constant scrutiny it should be under.
Admittedly, there are offenders on every scale of the market. However, by weaning ourselves off of ridiculously cheap clothing and campaigning for informative labels on what we wear is the first step of a very long marathon. By focusing on fair trade clothing we can incorporate traditional skills into products and promote peoples livelihoods, fair treatment and help communities to develop. Regardless of our views on foreign working conditions we can’t deny that wearing a unique and exclusive garment made with respect to the person who helped create it is right.

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