According to a report by Ethical Consumer magazine, Monsoon, the fashion retailer, was ranked last year as the most ethical company on the UK high street. The ironic thing is, Monsoon’s internal audits reveal its suppliers use child labour and underpaid workers.
Children were found working at subcontractors’ factories in India and China. Although the subcontractors were fired later, Monsoon still continues to work with the supplier involved. As some of you may know, Monsoon has been a member of the Ethical Trading Initiative for over 10 years. It employs an army of auditors and inspectors to check conditions, so how is it possible to find human rights abuses in their supply chain?
Samantha Maher, a policy coordinator at Labour Behind the Label, says “Most of the ‘ethical’ work done by retailers is little more than window-dressing”. Fashion retailers search the world to look for suppliers who agree to the lowest price possible, accept unreasonable terms of trade and take on all the risks and difficulties of producing clothing for the constantly changing taste of consumers. This cost and risk is inevitably passed down to the people at the bottom: the women and children in large factories.
Ethical trade is not just about satisfying consumers, it’s also about making a difference to the lives of millions of workers behind the scene. It’s time for Monsoon to really start taking action.
References:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/nov/21/monsoon-supply-chain-retail-comment
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010/nov/21/monsoon-child-labour-india
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