The country’s readymade garment sector will achieve sustainable growth if more coordination between media and stakeholders are ensured, speakers said in a seminar in Dhaka on Tuesday.
They said media access to garment industry can ensure transparency of the garment sector and help develop better workplace condition — a key issue which is made prerequisite by the international buyers.
aThe speakers also stressed on coordinated effort between all stakeholders and media for prosperity and development of the garment sector and to remain competitive on the world market.
They discussed on ways of various challenges and opportunities facing the biggest export industry of the country to address the issues to various stakeholders and asked them to work in collaboration for the sustainability of the industry.
This is the era of modern communication strategy and the BGMEA has to accept it to ensure transparency in the RMG sector, Netherlands ambassador to Bangladesh Gerben de Jong said in the seminar on ‘Taking the RMG Sector Forward – The Role of Media in Sustainable Development’ at Sonargaon Hotel in the capital.
The Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association and the Bangladesh Brand Forum organised the seminar on the occasion of Batexpo 2013.
The Dutch ambassador suggested the garment owners to open the doors to the media. ‘In the days before Tazreen Fashions fire and Rana Plaza collapse the BGMEA protected the interests of its members and denied any accusation of media.’
Now those days have gone, Gerben observed.
If any further incident takes place in the garment sector, the EU buyers would not consider whether the factory is the member of BGMEA or not, he said.
And so, the stakeholders have to work for the whole sector and the BGMEA has a lot of responsibility in this regard, the ambassador said.
The Financial Express editor Moazzem Hossain said sustainable development was not an event, it was a process.
Affordability and capacity building is needed to make a viable and sustainable RMG sector, he said.
The industry people have to ease the flow of information as the basic duty of the media is covering events, dig out the facts, and provide investigative and in-depth reports, Moazzem said.
The RMG sector is the soul of the economy of Bangladesh and it is a futuristic initiative to develop the sector in the face of vandalism in and around the industry centring the minimum wage of the workers, Moazzem said.
He also urged the RMG industry owners not to deal with any journalists beyond ethical ground and to check further or talk to the responsible people of respective media if they found anything unethical.
Dhaka Tribune editor Zafar Sobhan and former BGMEA vice-president Faruk Hassan presented two separate keynote papers in the seminar.
Media and RMG sector need to work hand to hand to help rebuild the image of the country in the world, Zafar said in his keynote paper.
In Bangladesh people are hungry for the positive stories and media needs to focus as much on the success stories as well as the failures, he said.
Faruk requested media to support the RMG sector in a constructive way.
He said, ‘We understand the role of media but the constructive criticism can help us identify our mistakes and rectify ourselves.’
BGCCI German House executive director Daniel Seidl, lawyer Tuhin Malik, New Age Group vice-chairman Asif Ibrahim, Benchmark Limited managing director Ashraf Kaiser, and BGMEA president Atiqul Islam spoke at the programme.
-With New Age input
