67 garment factories awarded GWG certification
The Island (subscription), Sri Lanka
67 garment factories received ‘Garments Without Guilt’ (GWG) certification at a special function organised by Joint Apparel Association Forum last Sunday after international auditors confirmed that these factories adhered to the GWG code of conduct which says no to child labour, forced labour and discrimination of any kind.
The code of conduct also places emphasis in the environment and strictly forbids sweatshop conditions in garment factories.
The audit was carried out by the SGS Group, a Swiss organisation with 50,000 employees in 140 countries specialising in carrying out social and environmental accountability audits.
Global Compliance Manager for SGS Jonathan Hall said that social and ethical practices are viewed as fundamental aspects of business and play an imperative role in securing an organisation’s competitiveness.
“The future will be such that only those businesses which adopt social and ethical practices will be able to survive,” he said.
‘Garments Without Guilt’ was launched by Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF) in 2014 as an image building campaign to secure buyers for garments manufactured in Sri Lanka by promoting the ethical conditions prevailing in the industry.
“This was what we had with us for a long time,” Chairman JAAF, Ajith Dias, said, “We never talked about or promoted it to our buyers. We never had issues of child labour, ethical compliance issues and neither did we ever find consumers protesting in front of retail stores that our garments were produced in sweatshops. But now, GWG is gathering momentum and our buyers, as well as our competitors, are giving us their attention.”
Dias said that compliance is a costly affair which has resulted in garments produced in Sri Lanka to be more expensive than competitor countries.
However, consumers world over are showing great concern about how products they consume are being produced.
Neil Hacket, Country Manager, Marks and Spencer said that compliance of the GWG code of conduct was the only thing differentiating Sri Lanka from the rest of the garment manufacturing countries.
“It is not about minimising costs to reap better returns, but it is all about what else you can do,” he said explaining that consumers would be willing to pay more for products produced ethically.
Kumar Mirchandani, Chairman, JAAF Marketing Committee, said that phase one of GWG was completed with the research and launch of GWG.
“Now we move on to the second phase where we will engage specific audiences worldwide and reach out to our consumers with our message. Sri Lanka Apparel is a caring brand and we run business the right way and should be proud about it,” he said.
The garment industry employs 272,000 out of which 80 per cent are women and JAAF through GWG conducts various programmes to empower these women not only in work but also in their personal lives. – DD
