Striking for a better wage in 2023

This week I read a passing comment on my #SustainUAE group, (an amazing bunch of people dedicated to running impactful businesses towards climate action & climate justice). The comment was "Fashion is one of the least worked on sectors in the sustainability drive". There is definitely not enough being done in this industry yet many in the group are working in sustainable fashion and pre-loved clothing sector, creating sustainable fashion and educating on this industry and last weekend they held a Sustainable Fashion Forum at University of Wollongong in Dubai Pavilion at Expo City and today at Dubai Design District. But it got me thinking and prompted this article, not from the point of view of the awful emissions from the industry and the effects on our environment, but from the humanitarian side.

Albeit the fashion industry is not my industry or area of expertise, I am nevertheless acutely aware as a conscious consumer, what is happening in this industry. It is #3 on the list of largest polluting industries after food and construction. It emits 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions, releasing 1.2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide per year, more than the shipping and the aviation industry combined. We all know the facts and figures of how many thousands of litres of good clean water is used to make t-shirts and jeans, a disturbing enough fact considering 2 billion people globally do not have access to clean water on a daily basis. We also know that high fashion does not enter the second hand market, but invariably ends up in an incinerator (more emissions) and the landfills worldwide are packed with discarded clothing. I won't bore you with these known facts but what I want to draw attention to, is the human aspect of this industry, the underpaid workers, who most of the time are working in unacceptable conditions.

It was brought home to me this week from two different sides. One was the fact that the Bangladeshi workers who are paid a miserly $75 per month, were on strike to seek better pay, while at the same time Pharrell Williams in collaboration with Louis Vuitton brought to the market a bag with a selling price of one million dollars. Putting aside the fact that this bag is made of crocodile skin, gold and diamonds (thankfully comes in a variety of colours), and I know the billionaires need new exclusive goodies to amuse them, but is there no conscience among them to think about the waste of resources and the effect on human lives. The following is a really disturbing fact, $1,000,000 could pay the salaries of at least 14,000 people monthly, at their current salary of $75 , and that is the price of one bag, just one bag. They do not have many voices to support them, including their own Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina, to get their salaries increased. In fact she was quoted as saying, “If they take to the streets to protest at someone’s instigation, they will lose their job, lose their work and will have to return to their village". They are looking for an increase in salary from $75 to $208.

Now I do understand the economics of this whole story and the value of this industry to the Bangladeshi and other economies. In Balgladesh alone, the 3,500 garment factories, account for about 85 percent of the country’s $55 billion in annual exports. To address the root of this issue, I believe the responsibility lies at the feet of the fashion houses they supply, H&M, Gap, Walmart, Levi's, Zara and many more brands. Without a doubt they are making huge profits, Zara had a whooping 27% increases in profits in 2022, H&M so so, but still 10% rise. We as consumers also play a huge role, but give us better choices and we will make them. Stop pushing 10 different varieties of the same shirt on us, stop telling us we need to have different items from the Spring, Summer, Fall and Winter catalogue, we don't need it, especially not at the expense of another human being and our environment. We can work with these industries, shareholders and fashion houses by stop putting the blame on the consumer or the industry and work together to make a just solution for all. We are all economic slaves fuelling the 1%.

Who am I to judge. I believe as a humanist, I have every right to question greed and over consumption especially when this effects social justice and our environment. I also firmly believe that we need to start making our voices heard and start calling out these injustices because it is never right, never, to have excessive profit when others are suffering.