Yesterday I wrote the following in a brief meditation on the subject of plant safety, West, Texas, and Dhaka, Bangladesh, in particular:
RE the outrage over the Dhaka collapse: But it's early days. The outrage may only last so long--until the next disaster. And there are so many causes, not all of which have anything to do with factory safety: the fact that Bangladesh is so poor; that it has a large population for whom even the risable wages they make are a god-send; that 80% of the garment workers are women with few rights; that corruption at all levels of government is rampant; and that its best customers--first-world countries--have an insatiable appetite for cheap t-shirts and other trendy clothing.
This morning, Reuters published this story which turns out to be an expansion of the above paragraph. The headline reads "How Textile Kings Weave a Hold on Bangladesh." I know that the third-world garment industry isn't really our brief here at ControlGlobal, but the situation described in this piece is instructive. Factory safety isn't just about the people on the ground or the systems in place. There are lots of actors involved, not all of whom have ever set foot in a factory.
The West, Texas, story is also taking on some interesting nuances. A Reuters exclusive reports that the West plant has suffered a series of break-ins over the past years--the suspects include meth dealers.
