Sunday, November 25, 2012

The blood price of capitalism

112 people are now known to have died in a fire that swept through a clothes factory in the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka.  The fire started on the ground floor trapping many victims in the factory and some people died after jumping from the building to escape the flames. The factory had no fire exit on the outside of the building.

Fatal fires are common in Bangladesh's large garment manufacturing sector. In December 2010, a fire in another clothes factory in the same industrial zone, leaving at least 25 people dead.  Just weeks ago 11 people were killed in a fire in a shanty town outside Dhaka and destroying more than 500 homes. The shanty town is home to low-income people such as labourers and rickshaw-pullers, many of whom have now been left homeless. In June 2010 a fire killed at least 116 people in the old part of the capital Dhaka.

 It seems pretty clear that builders and landlords ignore Bangladesh's planning and safety regulations. Instead of installing a fire-escape, for example, they pay bribes to officials and politicians. As a result there are thousands of these death traps across the city.

Clothes account for up to 80% of Bangladesh's $24bn (£15bn) annual exports. There are around 4,500 factories in Bangladesh, employing more than two million people.

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