Bangladesh rejects garment worker exploitation report

DHAKA, Dec 12 (Reuters) - A leader of Bangladesh's textile industry today rejected a British television report that garment workers were being paid less than the recently increased minimum wage.

''Our garment factories pay their workers in accordance with the minimum wage fixed by the government,'' said S. M Fazlul Hoque, president of the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA).

The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) had reported that textile workers in Bangladesh were getting as little as five pence an hour to make cheap clothes for UK retailers Tesco, Asda and Primark.

Fazlul said the report, broadcast on December 7 and based on a study by War on Want, an anti-poverty group, was ''an attempt by a vested quarter to undermine the country's apparel sector''.

The three British companies had strongly denied the allegation, he said.

Fazlul said Bangladeshi factories were complying with agreements that raised the garment workers' initial monthly pay to 1,662 taka from 950 taka with effect from October.

Garments are Bangladesh's biggest export, earning more than 7.9 billion dollars in the year to June 2006. Over 95 per cent are exported to the United States and European Union.

The sector employs 2.2 million workers, mostly women.

The BBC said War on Want had interviewed 60 workers in six factories.

''The survey was done with a specific purpose, to harm Bangladesh's booming garment sector, which now has a bigger market in Europe than in the United States,'' Fazlul said, urging foreign buyers to come and see the real picture for themselves.

REUTERS SHB ND1548