CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION

The safety in workplace is one of the most crucial issues that cannot be taken
lightly. While certain occupations are inherently dangerous and not all risks can be
eliminated, employers and employees should strive to make work non-hazardous.
Workplace health and safety is defined as the systems and processes that are put
in place to define how things are being done, whilst minimizing the exposure to risk.
Although safety and health are closely related they are not the same. Safety is
concerned with injury causing situation, health is more concerned with disease
causing situations. Safety deals with hazards to humans that result from sudden
severe conditions, meanwhile health deals with adverse reactions to prolonged
exposure to dangerous hazards.

The workplace accident occurring during the daily operations results in no win
situation. So, when accident occurs, it should always be promptly reported to the office
of Safety and Health to ensure that immediate action could be taken by the
organization. Further inspection could be conducted to identify the factors causing the
accident and the way on how to prevent it from occurring in the future. An employee
also urged to report any near miss injuries or accidents either to their supervisors or
Safety and Health Office. Heinrich et.al, (1980), a leading Industrial Safety Engineer,
developed the Domino Theory. He believed that all accidents could be modelled with
a chain of five factors which are ancestry and social environment, the fault of a person,
an unsafe act and/or physical hazard, an accident and the resulting injury. With
moderate and high psychological distress it wills more likely leading to the risk of
workplace accident.

The construction industry stands out from other employments as having one of
the highest worker injury and fatality rates. The construction industry has the most
fatalities of any other industry sector for many countries of the world and currently for
Bangladesh its fatality rate is the second largest only falling behind the garments
sector. Many studies have shown that a fairly large percentage of construction
accidents could have been eliminated, reduced, or avoided if simple safety techniques
and practices were applied at the sites and the workers were trained and made aware
of the safety hazards present in the sites. Also addressing construction safety in the
design and planning phase, can have a substantial impact on reducing injuries and

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the cost associated with safety related project delays. According to Toole (2002), most
construction accidents result from basic root causes such as lack of proper training,
deficient enforcement of safety, unsafe equipment and methods for sequencing,
unsafe site conditions, not using the safety equipment that was provided, and a poor
attitude towards safety.

Bangladesh is one of the newly born developing country. Construction sector

plays a significant role on Bangladesh national economy since past few years. In 2016,
this industry has earn 7.67% of growth GDP of Bangladesh (Bangladesh Bureau of
Statistics, 2016). But construction industry is considered as one of the most unsafe
and uncertain industrial activities in the country. In Bangladesh, the statistics reported
that thousands of workers are being injured and killed each year due to the work
related accidents, where the construction industry has recorded more than forty
percent of the occupational injuries and fatalities (Safety and Rights Society report,
2015). There are lots of human tragedies, loss of life, less productivity and delays of
projects are occurring because of construction accidents.

In this assignment, the collapse of Rana Plaza Building in Bangladesh will be

explored and studied. This case is among the worst industrial accidents on record and
the case had awoke the world to the poor labor conditions faced by workers. Therefore,
this study sets the objectives of awareness in action through the tragedy of Rana Plaza
Building, causes of the incident, analyzing after disaster: ongoing tragedy,
commitment of the various party after the disaster and finally the lesson learnt from
the horrific accident.

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CHAPTER 2: THE RANA PLAZA ACCIDENT

The Rana Plaza has become the symbol or icon of poor compliance to
workplace safety and security in Bangladesh’s industrial sector. Rana plaza disaster
is the one of the worst man-made disaster in Bangladesh’s history, claiming lives of at
least 1132 people and injured more than 2500 people. The building was owned by
Sohel Rana, the youth wing of Bangladesh Awami League (the political party in
power). It housed a number of separate garment factories employing around 5,000
people, several shops, and a bank. Five garment factories were in operation in the
Rana Plaza were New Wave Style Ltd., NewWave Bottom Ltd., Phantom Apparels
Ltd., Phantom Tac Ltd. and Ether Tex Ltd. The factories manufactured apparel for
most of the top brands such as Benetton, Bonmarche, Prada, Gucci, Versace,
Moncler, the Children's Place, El Corte Ingles, Joe Fresh, Monsoon Accessorize,
Mango, Matalan, Primark, and Walmart.

The nine-storey Rana Plaza building that housed 5 garment factories, a

commercial bank and a market, collapsed in the morning of 24 April. None of the
workers would have died if the factory remained closed after a major fault in the
building was identified the day before the incident. One day before the incident, all the
workers of five factories were prevented from entering the building after their lunch
break. There were cracks of two inches deep had formed in the walls spanning several
floors, prompting the bosses of the five garment factories housed inside to send
employees home for the day. A local engineer was called in to inspect the cracks and
had declared the building “vulnerable,” recommending that it should be sealed off
and examined by experts from Bangladesh’s leading technical university. Word of the
cracked columns reached a local TV station, which sent a crew to the site. A
cameraman slipped inside and filmed for just a few minutes before being driven off by
Sohel Rana’s men. A story about the cracks was broadcast later that evening.
However, the building’s owner, Sohel Rana ordered Rana Plaza to be open for
business. Some workers didn’t bother to show up, while scores of others gathered in
front of the building but refused to go inside. Next door, the bank that normally would
have been open for business was locked and closed. At Rana’s instruction, factory
managers ordered workers inside. Few workers approached the supervisor to voice
out their worries but were reminded of a fast-approaching shipment deadline for an
important Western client. If they protested any further, he told them, they would lose

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a month’s wages. The workers continue to do their job until the power abruptly cut off,
a common occurrence in Dhaka. Within seconds, four diesel generators, stationed at
the rear of the building near the main staircase, automatically started up, and the
factory lights flickered on again. The generators weighed several metric tons each,
and their relentless vibrations pulsed through the building and the building collapsed.

2.1 Causes of incident

The collapse is thought to have started with a column near the southwest corner
of the seventh floor, triggering a chain reaction that took less than a minute from start
to finish.

Figure 1: Anatomy of the collapse

An investigation into the building after the collapse found that the mayor of the
city wrongly granted approval for construction and allowed the owner to disregard
construction codes. The head of the Bangladesh Fire Service & Civil Defense, Ali

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Ahmed Khan, said that the upper four floors had been built without a permit. Rana
Plaza's architect, Massood Reza, said the building was planned for shops and offices
but not factories. Other architects stressed the risks involved in placing factories inside
a building designed only for shops and offices, noting the structure was potentially not
strong enough to bear the weight and vibration of heavy machinery

The building’s owner, Sohel Rana illegally constructed the upper floors of the
building to house factories with several thousand workers and large power generators
that shook the building whenever switched on. When the generators were switched on
that day, the building collapsed. Murder charges were brought against Rana and 37
others held responsible for the disaster. Three other people were charged with helping
Rana flee after the collapse. Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina declared April 25 a national
day of mourning, ordering the arrest of Sohel Rana and the owners of the five garment
factories that leased the building.

Figure 2: The remains of Rana Plaza in 2013

To sum up, the direct reasons for the building problems were building built on
a filled-in pond which compromised structural integrity, conversion from commercial
use to industrial use, addition four floors above the original permit and the use of
substandard construction material (which led to an overload of the building structure
aggravated by vibrations due to the generators). Those reasons indicated how dubious
the business practices and administrative practices in the Rana Plaza Building.

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CHAPTER 3: AFTER DISASTER (ON-GOING TRAGEDY)

Rana Plaza building collapse disrupted the entire function of the factories
housed at that building causing massive economic loss of the factory owners and
global firms. For the workers the loss was more massive. Conducting a research
among 181 Rana Plaza survivors, Fitch et al. (2015) found that one year after the
incident, the prevalence of probable PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder, which has
been reported to be associated with depression, substance abuse, sleeping difficulty,
difficulty in finding employment, and an overall decrease in perceived health status)
was very high (60.2%) among the survivors. Along with physical suffering and
economic insecurity, social complications have been added to the lives of the female
survivors.

A survey conducted with over 1414 Rana Plaza survivors and 794 family
members by the Action Aid Bangladesh (2015), revealed that the survivors of Rana
Plaza were still in a traumatic state that barred them from going back to factory work
again. Receiving training on small business and entrepreneurship development from
NGOs, only few of the survivors have become able to turn back. Despite the
international outcry following the building collapse at Rana Plaza, more than half of
survivors remain unemployed due to the physical injuries and psychological impact of
the disaster. The unemployment rate among the survivors has increased almost 10%
in the last two years, according to an annual survey of survivors’ health, wellbeing and
economic security, published by Action Aid. The charity, which provided emergency
relief following the tragedy and campaigns on women’s rights in the labour market,
has tracked 1400 Rana Plaza survivors since 2013, interviewing 200 of them this year
and found that 20.5% said that their physical health condition is getting worse, 51%
remain unemployed due to their physical injuries and poor mental health. Of the
unemployed survivors, 74% could not get back to work due to physical injuries and
27% due to poor mental health - as a direct result of the incident, 10.5% are still
suffering from trauma and only 15.5% of the employed survivors have returned to the
garment industry.

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CHAPTER 4: COMITMENTS AFTER DISASTER BY VARIOUS PARTY

The Rana Plaza tragedy, among the worst industrial accidents on record,
awoke the world to the poor labour conditions faced by workers in the ready-made
garment sector in Bangladesh. Most of the factories do not meet standards required
by building and construction legislation. As a result, deaths from fire incidents and
building collapses are frequent.

After the disaster, Bangladesh Garment Sramik Sanghati, an organisation

working for the welfare of the workers, has called on the government, international
buyers and factory owners to compensate survivors and victims' families. More than
200 apparel companies from 20 countries signed the Accord on Fire and Building
Safety in Bangladesh to prevent similar tragedies from happening. The signatories
include American Eagle Outfitters, Abercrombie & Fitch, Zara and H&M. The terms of
the accord include inspections by independent auditors, public reporting of the findings
and mandatory fire and building safety reforms, paid for by the retailers. In addition,
the firms are required to cut off business with any factory that refuses, or is unable, to
correct the hazards. Not least, the pact empowers workers and unions to be part of
the process, with union-led worker training and worker-led health and safety
committees. In addition, workers will have the right to refuse dangerous work,
according to the Clean Clothes Campaign.

At the same time, a number of local and international organizations made their
pledges and commitments. A large part of these pledges were made immediately after
the incident particularly addressing the immediate challenges and needs. Pledges
were also made with regard to legal actions against those who are responsible for the
occurrence of the accident. Retailers and international organizations made their
commitments with regard to medium-term issues, such as improvement of fire safety
and security at the workplace. The group has also asked that April 24 be declared
Labour Safety Day in the country.

It is also recorded that from 2014 to 2018, the number of factories in

multipurpose buildings has dropped by 49 percent, from 155 factories to 79 factories.
The number of unions in Bangladesh has rose dramatically in the months after the
building collapse. This is because unions can help train the members to identify

7
workplace hazards and report them, and if workers are retaliated against as a result,
the union can intervene.

In term of safety measure, various initiatives undertaken with regard to building

safety and related issues were mainly pursued out of legal obligations. Five agencies
of government have started inspecting factory buildings. A total of 16 factories in
Dhaka and two factories in Chittagong have been closed temporarily to improve their
infrastructure. A high-powered committee of the Government headed by the Minister
for Textiles and Jute, has been working on inspecting the safety and security of
factories. A total of 11 teams which comprised officials of factory inspection authority,
Fire Service Civil Defence authority, the capital development authority of Bangladesh
(RAJUK) and others have completed inspection of at least 20 factories each, and
prepared report for submitting to the above mentioned committee with
recommendations for next course of action. Fire Service and Civil Defence authority
has also inspected garment factories in Dhaka and Chittagong. To ensure building
safety and security, the government has decided not to allow set up of any garment
factories in vulnerable buildings in order to ensure the safety of the workers. In an
immediate reaction, Ministry of Commerce mentioned that at least 200 factories are to
be shut down immediately due to poor physical condition. Bangladesh Garments
Manufacturer and Export association (BGMEA) has committed to inspect the physical
condition of the factory buildings, and therefore, asked members to submit building
design and soil test reports. Out of 2425 running factory members of BGMEA 1819,
and out 1000 running factory of BKMEA 353 have submitted their required papers to
the authority. However, it has yet to set any strategy about how to examine the
documents and take appropriate actions. BGMEA has signed a memorandum of
understanding (MoU) with the Institute of Planners, Bangladesh and Institute of
Architects, Bangladesh to identify the indicators for building standard. BGMEA has
ordered its member factories to remove generators placed above the ground floor of
the buildings by 30 May.

Global initiatives are visible with regard to improving the workplace safety and
security and factory buildings. US Department of Labour which earlier announced to
provide USD 2.5 million for improvements in the enforcement and monitoring of fire
and building safety standards to better protect workers in the Ready Made Garments
(RMG) sector. Applications have to be submitted in early August 2013, and fund to be

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released in September 2013. EU has launched a major global agreement for
Bangladesh to improve labour rights, working conditions and factory safety for which
it will extend technical assistance. Besides, ILO, EU and Bangladesh government has
launched global sustainability compact to improve labour rights and working conditions
which will be implemented in 2013-2014. It has also established the neutral chair for
the Accord on Fire and Building Safety in Bangladesh. Under its RBSA programme, a
number of initiatives will be undertaken including training of 200 factory inspectors,
procurement of equipment for building inspection, workers’ education and preparing a
full-fledged ‘better work programme’. Japan Interactional Cooperation Agency (JICA)
has provided fund to take projects for improvement of building conditions.

Following the Rana Plaza disaster, local authorities and stakeholders at the
national and international levels, with the involvement of organizations such as the
IndustriALL Global Union and Clean Clothes Campaign, took bold steps to strengthen
occupational safety and health, labour inspection services, skills training and
rehabilitation services in the long term, notably with the support of the International
Labour Organization (ILO) and of global buyers. Action has also been taken to
implement a national employment injury scheme in Bangladesh based on the
principles of Convention No. 121 and a mutual consensus on the core elements of the
scheme. The operationalization of an Employment Injury Insurance (EII) scheme will
provide the appropriate health care and compensation to the victims in an efficient and
diligent manner and on a temporary basis.

In line with the action plan on business and human rights, the UK response has
focused on building safety, improving working conditions, improving communications
between owners and employees and urging UK buyers to take responsibility for their
supply chains from the store right back to the sewing machine. On a practical level,
the UK, through DFID, is providing up to £4.8 million for a three-year programme by
the International Labour Organisation to support the National Action Plan on Fire
Safety and Structural Integrity. DFID has also made £1.8 million available to the Trade
and Global Value Chains Initiative to support partnerships between buyers, factory
owners, civil society and others, in order to improve garment factory conditions in
Bangladesh. The UK has also launched an £18 million programme to improve private
sector skills training in the garment and construction sectors.

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CHAPTER 5: LESSON LEARNT FROM RANA PLAZA TRAGEDY
After Rana Plaza tragedy, the focus is rightfully on the first step of getting a grip
on the factory system and preventing another tragedy such as fires and building
collapses. Workplace health and safety is a core human right, as basic as the right to
live the life. All the workers need to ensure their health and safety by understanding
the right to know about the hazards they face on the job, the right to refuse to work
under hazardous conditions, and the right to seek redress of harm without risking
retaliation. It is also important for workers to join or organise in strong unions as an
advocate for health and safety of the job, training workers and providing emergency
assistance. A worker-led programs were by far the most effective, because they
empowered workers to understand the real hazards they confronted every day, to
establish union health and safety committees that could go head-to-head with
management and to engage in collective bargaining with the company over workplace
conditions. Real health and safety on the job means that workers share power over
the conditions of their labour with their employers. The Rana Plaza tragedy shows
many shared value from various party from local and international body. There is the
changes whereby there is a systematic industry collaboration, working with
governments, trade unions, the ILO that secure confidence, they have learned their
lesson and will take decisive action.

In order to reduce the accident rate, the action from government need to be
increased and highly enforced. The laws in Bangladesh are seriously out of sync with
international labour and human rights standards, but in many countries where such
laws do exist, governments have failed to enforce them. For example, in Malaysia we
have Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) act to compliance with.

Apart from that, we need to empower workers. The Rana Plaza incident is a
tragic example of how workers too seldom have the ability to protect their own
interests. It is essential that workers be given a voice in their own affairs and welfare.
Companies also have a responsibility to respect human rights, which means taking
necessary actions to prevent the risks to the rights of workers in their own operations.
The Rana Plaza disaster also led to progress, supported by the International Labour
Organization, on labour law reform, labour inspection, workplace safety and
compensation for injuries to take steps to strengthen inspections of working conditions
in factories.

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CHAPTER 6: CONCLUSION

Garment exports represent an important engine of growth for Bangladesh. The

industry employs millions of people, enabling an agrarian society to move from the
farm to the city. It has empowered women and created jobs for people who had poorer
alternatives. It is in nobody’s interest to harm the sector. However, practical, sound,
and achievable actions are needed to ensure that the human rights of some of the
world’s most vulnerable and hard-working people are protected. The challenge is for
Bangladesh’s politicians, factory owners, unions, and civil society groups to work
together, in partnership with donors, international brands, and international unions and
human rights groups to ensure that the tragedy of Rana Plaza is never repeated.

There is often a conflict between profit goals and the goal of worker safety.
Virtually every company focuses on making money, but they also have an ethical
obligation to provide reasonable safety to workers. When company officials focus upon
only profits and ignore worker safety, this unfortunate framing of their decision can
lead to unethical and tragic decisions. This was the case of the Rana Plaza collapse
in Bangladesh. Although there is the collective efforts after the incidents, but more
needs to be done. We must ponder for a moment why Rana Plaza happened and why
the factory was housed in a building that was not fit for a factory, let alone a number
of them which the building actually housed and not to speak of the fact that it was in
an unsafe state. Usually, the underlying motivation is always due to the drive to
produce cheaply. It is certainly, Rana Plaza has been a wakeup call for the apparel
sector, but this lesson is not limited to that industry. We could spend more time
analysing what has gone wrong and why, but it’s time to put the efforts into taking the
actions we know will make a difference.

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Dhaka: Bangladesh Occupational Safety, Health and Environment Foundation

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at-rana-plaza

Dey, S., & Basak, P. (2016). Rana Plaza Disaster and Thereafter: Evaluating Efforts to
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Fitch, T., Villanueva, G., Quadir, M.M., Sagiraju, H.K.R., & Alamgir, H. (2015). The
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Gov.UK. (2014). The Rana Plaza disaster. Retrieved from

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ATTACHMENT

Figure 3: Mozaffar, survivor of the Rana plaza collapse, who lost a leg in the incident

Figure 4: Photo of Rana Plaza before and after collapse

Figure 5: Rana Plaza’s owner, Sohel Rana arrested

Figure 6: The crack of Rana Plaza building before collapse

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