• Login
    • Library Home
    View Item 
    •   BracU IR
    • Department of Economics and Social Sciences (ESS)
    • Masters of Social Sciences in Economics
    • Theses (MSS in Economics)
    • View Item
    •   BracU IR
    • Department of Economics and Social Sciences (ESS)
    • Masters of Social Sciences in Economics
    • Theses (MSS in Economics)
    • View Item
    JavaScript is disabled for your browser. Some features of this site may not work without it.

    Impact of the Accord and Alliance on labor productivity of the Bangladesh RMG industry

    Thumbnail
    View/Open
    19175001_ESS.pdf (1.128Mb)
    Date
    2020-07
    Publisher
    Brac University
    Author
    Chowdhury, Sabrina Fatema
    Metadata
    Show full item record
    URI
    http://hdl.handle.net/10361/14748
    Abstract
    The year 2013 saw one of the most tragic accidents in the readymade garment (RMG) industry, the Rana Plaza accident, which claimed more than 1100 lives of garment workers. This accident drew attention of the world to the failures in ensuring safety in the workplace. In an attempt to make sure such an accident does not occur in future, two transnational governance initiatives were introduced; “Accord on fire and building and safety in Bangladesh” (Accord) and “Alliance for Bangladesh worker safety” (Alliance), and these two initiatives have been guided by the principles of occupational safety and health (OSH). Also, an initiative by Bangladesh government, “National Tripartite Plan of Action” (NTPA) was taken to ensure worker safety in RMG factories. The study aims to find if actions taken by the Accord and Alliance to implement OSH regulations in their affiliated factories could make a strong impact on labor productivity of their member factories, amongst other factors effecting labor productivity at factory level such as; factory size, factory age, wage of skilled labor, management indicators, and export status. Also, the study aimed to compare the findings for the Accord and Alliance affiliated factories with NTPA affiliated factories. The study uses two approaches; quantitative and qualitative. In the quantitative approach, two types of models; ordinary least squares (OLS) estimation and multinomial logistic regression are used to estimate the effect of aforementioned factors on factory level labor productivity. The study argues that, there is no strong positive relationship between factories being affiliated with the Accord and Alliance, and labor productivity, because apart from building safety, other factors also influenced labor productivity. The qualitative study helped to identify possible reasons for changes in labor productivity by analyzing experiences of factory owners/managers (affiliated with the Accord and Alliance) during implementation of remediation works and experiences regarding costs associated with the remediation works. The study identified that the resources required to enhance labor productivity were diverted to expensive remediation work as there was no assistance from the buyer side in terms of funding the remediation work, and the factories were often assigned with expensive remediation works. Policies such as; creation of a common fund by all the stakeholders, providing skill development training and investing in physical capital of factories, ensuring fair pricing and recommending cost effective safety improvements, that are also suitable for local specificities; should be taken to address the identified problems and enhance labor productivity.
    Keywords
    Labor productivity; Bangladesh RMG Industry; Accord; Alliance
     
    Description
    This thesis is submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science in Applied Economics, 2020.
     
    Cataloged from PDF version of thesis.
     
    Includes bibliographical references (pages 71-82).
    Department
    Department of Economics and Social Sciences, Brac University
    Collections
    • Theses (MSS in Economics)

    Copyright © 2008-2023 Ayesha Abed Library, Brac University 
    Contact Us | Send Feedback
     

     

    Policy Guidelines

    • BracU Policy
    • Publisher Policy

    Browse

    All of BracU Institutional RepositoryCommunities & CollectionsBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjectsThis CollectionBy Issue DateAuthorsTitlesSubjects

    My Account

    LoginRegister

    Statistics

    View Usage Statistics

    Copyright © 2008-2023 Ayesha Abed Library, Brac University 
    Contact Us | Send Feedback