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Fashion Industry

US Apparel Industry Endorses Looming Haiti Invasion

As the Biden administration works diligently to organize an invasion of Haiti – most recently with Kenya’s pledge to send 1,000 police officers – the sweatshop labor industry is celebrating. American Apparel and Footwear Association (AAFA) president and CEO Steve Lamar applauded Kenya’s recent announcement that it would send 1,000 police officers in support of an “anti-gang” mission, telling the trade publication Sourcing Journal that it “reinforces that a country like Kenya has shared values, and shared prosperity, with the United States and with Haiti, and is trying to be a long-term partner. He added that, “There may also be some residual benefits to the U.S.-Kenya, and writ-large, the U.S.-Africa relationship.”

Study Throws New Light On Unfair Practices By Global Fashion Brands

A study published this month found that popular international fashion brands with factories in Bangladesh were involved in multiple “unfair practices,” such as paying suppliers below the cost of production, which had an impact on workers and their livelihoods. The study conducted by Aberdeen University and advocacy group Transform Trade, titled ‘Impact of Global Clothing Retailers’ Unfair Practices on Bangladeshi Suppliers During COVID-19,’ was based on the survey of 1,000 Bangladeshi factories that manufacture garments for international fashion firms. It found that these factories were facing rising costs for raw materials, and nearly one in five struggled to pay the Bangladeshi minimum wage of £2.30 per day. Professor Pamela Abbott, co-investigator of the study and director of the Center for Global Development at the University of Aberdeen, claimed that fashion brands were extracting their wealth from some of the world’s poorest countries, a form of 21st century neo-colonialism.

Garment Workers Have Won Billions In Stolen Wages

In March 2020, Amanda Lee McCarty was laid off from her job. For years, she had been working in the fashion industry as a buyer and product developer. But as COVID-19 cases surged and lockdown orders were implemented across the world, retailers were faced with a dramatic plummet in consumer demand for clothing. McCarty, who had been the sole breadwinner in her family for most of her life, was left without a steady income or health insurance. McCarty wasn’t the only one in the global apparel industry whose future was thrust into uncertainty. Thousands of miles away, in countries like Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Cambodia, apparel factories had just received catastrophic news from retailers in the West. In order to offset the financial losses of the pandemic, executives had made a swift and nearly universal decision: They were going to steal $40 billion from their most vulnerable workers. 

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