Thanapara, a small village on the borders of Bangladesh surrounded by mango tress and the Ganga river, is a place at the very end of the world. Probably no one would expect that a well-known organization, Thanapara Swallows, which cooperates with many foreign partners has a base here and employs dozens of local women in its garment workshop.
The organization Thanapara Swallows produces cotton clothes for prestigious brands such as People Tree from UK and the Fair Trade Company from Japan, as well as for my small e-shop TukTuki. All the products are made according to the rules of fair trade – with respect for the producers and the environment. When I visited Thanapara, the organization was just in the middle of the accreditation process. The workers were marking emergency exits, concreting the floor and improving other details required by the accreditors. In November 2013 Thanapara Swallows got the official World Fair Trade Organization mark, which declares that the production process is running in accordance to the ten fair trade principles.
When I saw what is happening behind a high wall at the end of the village for the first time, I thought it must be a miracle. The whole production process is completely by hand and the technologies reminded me museum exhibits. Wooden looms, smouldering fires under the pots with dyes, pedal sewing machines – the women from Thanapara Swallows are able to make the highest-quality products using these tools.
The crazy manufacturing process reminds me very much of the market in the nearest city, Sardah. Dozens of workers in colourful saris carry thread, cloth and products from one place to the other, spreading the fabrics on the roof to dry them and carrying the wood while their colleagues are just sleeping after lunch or breastfeeding children. The women from the Thanapara village comprise the vast majority of the workers.
The organization Thanapara Swallows is the biggest employer in the area and the only opportunity for the women from surrounding district to get a paid job. About two hundreds of them are employed in the workshop and about one hundred work at home. Dozens of experts are also employed in the development project which is run from the profits of production. The nursery and elementary school are just two of the projects contributing to local community development. Thanks to these projects, the women working in the workshop can be close to their children, come to breastfeed them during the lunch break and take them home from school.
There is a coil of thread at the beginning of the whole process. It is because cotton threads are the only product which is bought. The rest of the production is entirely carried out by hand in the Thanapara workshop. First of all the threads are dyed. The dyes are made in two big pots by a trial and error method. I had to laugh when I first saw the manager standing in front of the computer with a piece of cloth comparing its colour with the colour on the monitor. It was less humorous for me to look at the workers dying the threads in boiling water using two huge bamboo sticks, hanging them on every single free space to dry them and making bobbins. You need only a gorgeous wheel and two skilful workers to prepare the warp for a loom.
Weaving is said to be the most difficult and most glamorous work here. Pushing the treadle, binding the threads, counting the sequences is done enormously quickly and can be managed only by the most experienced workers.
The biggest room is used for sewing and embroidering. The women use mechanical pedal sewing machines, only three of them are electrical. On one hand the pedal machines are slower and get stuck from time to time. On the other hand you can keep sewing even if the electricity doesn’t work, which happens quite often here. The “Iron Man” is a penultimate link in the production chain. The worker of this poetical position does simply…ironing. At the very end of the production there is the oldest employee of Thanapara Swallows. The respected old woman is responsible for the quality control and no piece of cloth can be packed without her agreement.
Each product of Thanapara Swallows passed through the hands of dozens of men and women. It is unbelievable how cheaply the goods can be produced and sold. The reason is the very low level of salaries – the minimum wage in the garment industry is 5300 Bangladeshi Taka, about 50 Euros. The workers in Thanapara Swallows workshop are paid according to their productivity. The most skilful can earn more than two minimum wages a month. The money is enough to live on, buy school supplies for children and maybe even to save something. The organization also administers a fund helping the employees in case of illness or inability to work. It is the community way of management which transfers a garment factory into the fair trade workshop. All workers can decide about important aspects of the organization and everybody can also benefit from the organization’s earnings and services. Even if the working conditions and standards are incomparable to our perception of “decent labour” the situation is getting better and better. This is thanks to the dialogue of the management and employees, as well as thanks to the independent controls of World Fair Trade Organization and other partners.
In 1908, 15,000 women marched through New York City to demand shorter working hours, better pay and voting rights. This was the beginning of a movement from which International Women’s Day was born. Decades later, in 2011, the United Nations marked the 11th of October as the first International Day of the Girl Child, highlighting the continuing challenges which young girls still face in communities across the globe; especially in relation to accessing education, being safe from violence and exploitation. Within the fashion industry, the pressure to meet the demands of conventional fast fashion companies is enormous. To stay competitive, manufacturing factories keep their overheads low by paying low wages for workers. Child labourers can be paid even less and are an attractive proposition for employers. Parents are forced to send their children, including young girls to work in conditions which are unsafe in order to create enough income to sustain the family.
As a Fair Trade company, People Tree works with many social businesses who not only create decent employment and pay fair wages, but who also invest in their local community. For example, by funding schools, medical support and awareness raising on the rights of women and girls. We support communities in India, Bangladesh and Nepal who empower girls by giving them access to education and vocational training. By focusing on empowerment of women through dignified and artisanal work, we help keep handicraft traditions alive, as well as offer opportunities to help strengthen these communities and continue to support their learning and development. Equal opportunities are reflected throughout People Tree’s supply chain, where 56% of leadership roles are held by women.
In rural Bangladesh, girls are often not given opportunities to go to school, instead they are encouraged to stay at home to help around the house and to get married very young. People Tree works with Swallows, an NGO set up to empower the poor and underprivileged population, especially women, in the village of Thanapara. Swallows runs a handicrafts program which makes beautiful hand woven and hand embroidered garments. This business helps to fund Swallows’ development work in the local area, and the empowerment of girls and women is central to their work.
Mrs Gini Ali, Assistant Director at Swallows, feels that discrimination and lack of opportunity for women in Bangladesh are the biggest barriers to improving living conditions there. She says:
“The Fair Trade principles applied by People Tree have created economic stability for Swallows, allowing it to become an independent organisation, this has led to the empowerment of the women of Thanapara.”
Swallows funds schools and awareness raising to ensure that girls have the same chance to study as boys. They raise awareness amongst parents, sharing the importance of education for young girls and its benefits for the family and the community. As well as sharing the importance of education, Swallows raises awareness around the issue of child marriage and the negative impacts this can have. Swallows provides free training opportunities for young women and also sponsor young women to study part time whilst the work part time making Fair Trade clothing. As well as this they offer legal support to local women who are victims of domestic violence and raise awareness locally on the issue.
In Nepal, People Tree partners with Kumbeshwar Technical School (KTS). Originally set up as a vocational training centre, KTS has now developed into a Fair Trade business creating beautiful hand knitted products. Established in 1983 with the goal of breaking societal barriers created by Nepal’s caste system, KTS was set up to help Pode people, the so-called ‘untouchable’ caste in Nepal. Those born into the Pode caste are expected to clean the sewers and streets of the areas inhabited by higher castes for no more than scraps of leftover food. The discrimination which keeps these people out of other forms of work even affects children, who may drop out of primary school because they are unable to fit in. Until recently, Pode children did not go to school at all.
KTS now offers employment to 2,273 women who come from economically disadvantaged backgrounds. On top of this, the profits from Fair Trade helps fund vocational training; a school; a day care centre for over 250 children from low income families and an orphanage.
Both KTS and Swallows are both ‘Guaranteed Fair Trade Organisations’ by the World Fair Trade Organisation (WFTO). This recognises that the whole of the company is 100% dedicated to Fair Trade and ensures that all the groups adhere to the WFTO’s 10 Fair Trade Principles. Key to these 10 principles is Principle Six: ‘Commitment to Non Discrimination, Gender Equity and Women’s Economic Empowerment’. At People Tree we believe that Fair Trade business is a key driver in the empowerment of women and girls worldwide.
For more information about how People Tree supports women and girls, please contact us for a copy of our Social Review and read about People Tree’s latest Campaign Against Child Labour in our digital edition of the Eco-Edit: http://www.peopletree.co.uk/eco-edit
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