Clothes to Die For This World

This programme contains some scenes which some viewers may find upsetting.

SHOUTING AND SCREAMING

SHOUTING AND SCREAMING CONTINUES

We went shopping. And this happened.

This is what dreams are made of.

It goes in at the waist. It's got little T-shirt sleeves.

So yeah, H&M.

We buy three times as many clothes as we did 30 years ago.

I've got a rather large River Island bag here.

I went to Forever 21!

Fashion haul videos posted by enthusiastic shoppers get

millions of hits online.

Today I have a massive Primark haul.

I got this dress which I'm in love with.

Super jolie.

SHE SPEAKS GERMAN

Fashions change faster and cost less than ever before.

I picked this one up for £8.

This was £12, which I think

is a huge bargain for something as cool as this.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Almost all of us own something made in Bangladesh.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

I bought two dresses.

They're the same dress just in different colours.

I got another dress and, yes, I don't need any more dresses.

Hopefully, they won't be showing too much, like, butt cleavage,

because they're quite short.

In a desperately poor country making our clothes is the single

biggest earner for Bangladesh's 150 million people.

It now accounts for almost 80% of the country's exports

and provides millions of jobs.

It all started with one shirt.

The first shirt made by Desh trainees in Korea in 1979.

So this has a history?

-Yes, that's history.

-It's history.

It should really be in a museum.

My father is essentially the person who set up the garment

industry in Bangladesh.

What he wanted, as a big patriot, was to see the country grow,

for it to be the beginning of industrialisation,

for the country to have an economic backbone.

After independence in 1971,

Bangladesh was one of the poorest countries on earth.

Vidiya's father, Noorul Quader, a former civil servant,

had a vision of how to transform the country.

In 1978, he sent 130 trainees to South Korea,

where they learnt how to mass-produce clothes.

When they returned, he opened the first factory making clothes only for export.

Desh garments is still run by the family today.

When I'm in the UK and I pick up something

and I see "made in Bangladesh," I personally feel proud

because I know my father was behind this whole initiative.

Well, he was always thinking about the women,

How to go about or do something for the women, because women

are very dependent in our country and not so literate in the village.

I think that's how he was thinking.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Since 1979, tens of millions of people have migrated from the

countryside to cities - many to work in the growing clothing industry.

Shirin and Halima eventually settled in the outskirts

of Bangladesh's capital, Dhaka, in a district called Savar.

The area has been transformed by the arrival of garment factories.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

So many changes -

buildings, residential plots,

shopping centre, garments.

Very, very changes in 20 years.

For the new arrivals, Savar was an exciting place, offering

the possibility of liberation for young Bangladeshi women.

Shopna Khatun arrived in the city as a teenager.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

For workers from the countryside,

wages of around £5 a week were life-changing.

This army of cheap labour ensured that,

after China, Bangladesh would become the world's largest

supplier of clothes - a trade worth more than £15 billion a year.

But the vast profits on offer created a dark side to the industry.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

In Bangladesh, business and politics have become mixed to a degree

where corruption often dominates the clothing industry.

In Savar, one of the most powerful businessmen was Sohel Rana.

Rana built his fortune selling off farmland to

developers at a huge profit.

Brash and bullying, he had excellent political connections

and controlled the local youth wing of Bangladesh's ruling party.

Local journalists claim his political followers were

a force which protected him and intimidated his rivals.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Rana inspired fear in the factory workers.

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In 2009, Rana opened a prestigious new factory complex

in the centre of Savar.

He named it after himself - the Rana Plaza.

Garment factories rented space in the building

and eventually would provide up to 5,000 new jobs.

Most of the workers who flocked there cared

little about the man who built the Plaza.

For women like Rebeka, a job was a god-send.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

The Rana Plaza opened during a boom in the clothing business.

Across Bangladesh,

clothing exports were growing by more than 20% a year.

Business was so good Sohel Rana added three floors

to his building, and allowed the installation of massive

generators in these upper levels.

For a man with Rana's connections, planning permission was a formality.

The five factories in the building were now making

millions of clothes for more than 20 Western companies.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Nearly all Western companies had strict welfare guidelines

that their suppliers were supposed to follow.

Child labour had been banned, along with excessive working hours.

But with so many different suppliers and sub-contractors,

the rules were difficult to enforce

and it could be easy for Bangladeshi suppliers to cheat.

When Shirin started work at the Rana Plaza she was just 15.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

With new factories opening every week, competition was fierce.

Orders had to be delivered on budget and on time.

The pace of production in the Rana Plaza building was furious.

Dipu Asaduzzaman was the production manager on the fifth floor factory.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

These pressures led to corners being cut across Bangladesh.

In 2012, fire destroyed the Tazreen fashion factory in Dhaka.

Over 100 workers died.

There were no fire escapes and some exits were locked.

It was the worst of many tragedies across the industry.

But the work went on for the men and women of the Rana Plaza.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

By April 23rd, 2013,

all the ingredients for disaster were in place at the Rana Plaza.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Shariful Islam worked as a supervisor in the factory

on the second floor.

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Rumours that there were a crack in the pillar quickly

spread around the building and the factory workers rushed outside.

Television journalist, Nazmul Huda, headed there with his camera.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

In the wake of the Tazreen fashion fire, the crack

in the Rana Plaza was potentially a big story for the local media.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Eventually, Sohel Rana agreed to talk to Nazmul Huda

and other journalists.

Nazmul's report about the crack in the building went out that

night on national TV.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Despite the news coverage, the factory workers were told to

report for work as usual the next morning.

In the morning,

Javed Mostifa's article was published in a national newspaper.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

The garment workers gathered nervously outside the Rana Plaza.

A bank on the ground floor had stayed closed.

Its owners considered the building too dangerous.

But Sohel Rana and the factory managers insisted

the building was safe.

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SCREAMING AND SHOUTING

It took less than 90 seconds for the eight storey building to collapse.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Some workers survived by jumping to safety as the building fell.

Thousands of others were left trapped inside.

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SHOUTING

SIRENS WAIL

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The scale of the disaster overwhelmed the emergency services.

Hundreds of local people

and factory workers started frantic rescue attempts.

As pictures from the scene began to be broadcast,

more volunteers arrived from throughout the city.

Many risked their own lives to help.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

In the first few hours after the collapse, scores of people

trapped, like Shirin, were pulled out alive by the volunteers.

Monir decided he had no choice

but to carry out the amputation by himself.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

As the day went on, conditions inside the building became more

and more desperate.

As the first night fell, the full horror of the tragedy was

becoming apparent as more and more bodies were recovered.

Thousands of relatives kept vigil,

desperate for news of their loved ones.

Shopna had been trapped inside for nine hours when she was rescued.

As the night went on,

people still inside the building battled to survive.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

I was there the whole day.

And I went to the back part of the factory

and I saw there were many dead bodies.

And I saw two of them in the middle,

so I just looked at them.

One thing was moving in my head that our garment workers,

they are cheap labour, we know about this.

International brands, they come to our country to get cheap labour,

but now their life also becomes so cheap.

That time I was just thinking these things.

And somehow I feel so close with them.

WHISTLES BLOW

At 11.30 that night, over 14 hours after the collapse,

Rebeka too was rescued.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

By the second day, the majority of people being found were dead.

But some still survived,

trapped by the fallen structure of the building.

The hunt for survivors - and for bodies - went on for three weeks.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

As the scale of the disaster sunk in,

garment workers across Bangladesh rioted.

The world's attention focused on the Bangladeshi clothing industry.

Questions were asked about safety standards,

corruption and lax regulation.

There was even talk of a consumer boycott.

The government knew it needed to be seen to act,

and it focused its attention on the building's owner, Sohel Rana,

whose whereabouts remained unknown.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Now the hunt was on.

In charge was Colonel Ziaul Ashan.

After four days, Rana was caught attempting to flee to India.

The authorities appeared keen to blame the tragedy on the greed

and negligence of one man.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

A government inquiry soon concluded Rana had ignored safety advice

when he added three extra floors to his building -

and suggested he'd paid bribes to obtain permission to do it.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Working conditions in the developing world have become a hugely

sensitive issue for Western clothing companies.

Retailer Primark was the first to acknowledge that

some of its clothes had been made in the factory building

and has donated 9 million to the survivors

and the families of the dead who were making its clothes.

They're also giving 3 million to other workers in the building.

Other companies, including Loblaw, Matalan

and Bonmarche are making smaller donations.

But some families may never receive compensation.

322 unidentified bodies were buried here.

Each board has a number linking it to a DNA sample.

In a year, only half the bodies have been successfully identified.

She'll be still missing.

She is missing, Moni.

She is missing.

Following her experience at the Rana Plaza, photographer Taslima Akhter

has spent a year seeking justice for the families of the missing.

The missing workers who are still missing,

they haven't got any compensation, any emergency fund from government

fund, because they have not any proof that their family is missing.

But they need help because they don't know how to write and to read.

So all the time they need help.

That is Rekha. She is so young.

I think she is not 18.

She had to say that she is 18 because otherwise

she cannot get a job.

More than a year on, human remains are still being

found at the site, among the debris and blood soaked clothes.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

Since the disaster, some things have changed in Bangladesh's

clothing industry.

Most Western companies have pledged to inspect

the structures of the factories that make their clothes.

The Bangladeshi government has doubled the minimum wage.

At around £40 a month, it remains one of the lowest in the world.

This raises fundamental issues for the global garment industry.

Vidiya Khan, the daughter of the one of the first men to export

clothes from Bangladesh, owns a clothing factory.

If you want us to pay more and do more compliant factories,

then at the end of the day the retailers have to pay us more.

It is not a question of a clean shirt agenda

and a green something here and a green something there

and a fair wages campaign here and there - no.

Get the retailers together and make sure they pay us five cents more.

Not ten, not even ten, we don't even want ten cents, we want five,

we're happy with five cents on each piece of garment.

The fear is that the demand for clothing to be cheap

is so strong, that international brands will simply

switch their manufacturing to other countries where labour is cheaper.

For Bangladesh, this would be a disaster.

Can you imagine the volume,

the number of women that this industry supports?

It's not men, it's women.

For women to have that much empowerment, it's fantastic.

When Rana Plaza fell, reporters went to those workers

and they interviewed them and said,

"Would you ever work in a garments factory again?"

and many workers said "no".

But then there are many workers who said,

"Don't take this away from us because this is all we have,

"we do not want to go back to the villages".

The workers who survived the Rana Plaza are trying to

rebuild their lives.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI:

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TRANSLATION:

Rebeka had not known she was pregnant

when she was trapped inside the building.

Monir was always an ambitious businessman, but

since rescuing survivors from the rubble, his priorities have changed.

TRANSLATION:

He's now set up a factory that's a co-operative

owned by its workers, who are survivors of the Rana Plaza.

It's called "Oparajeyo" - "Undefeated."

Shirin, Shopna and Halima all work here.

Bangladesh is still one of the poorest countries in Asia.

But helped by the clothing industry, the economy is growing fast.

Despite the culture of low wages, corruption and exploitation which

led to the Rana Plaza disaster, there is optimism for the future.

TRANSLATION FROM BENGALI: