The Hindu Business Line : Primark action puts Tirupur exporters on the defensive

Coimbatore, June 18 The snapping of business ties with three Tirupur-based garment suppliers by the UK’s leading apparel retailer Primark on the child labour issue has put the Tirupur knitwear exporters on the defensive mode.

Tirupur knitwear exporting collective under their trade body, Tirupur Exporters Association, is taking stock of the situation to prevent the adverse fallout on their trade by Primark’s action.

“We are thinking of forming a common agency that can be entrusted with guiding the knitwear exporters in future on safe sub-contracting, keeping in terms with the ethical compliance sought by the garment buyers,” said Mr A. Sakthivel, President of TEA.The top UK fashion garment retailing store has snapped business ties with three unnamed vendors from Tirupur after a media leak that the three garment exporting companies employed child workers for the embroidery and sequin works involved in their export merchandise, in violation of the code of compliance it had with the three.

The Tirupur companies are said to have sub-contracted the embroidery works and the jobbing was done with the families in a refugee camp in Bhavanisagar near Tirupur.

Terming Primark’s action as something ‘unexpected’, Mr Sakthivel said such action by a buying house has happened for the first time.

The sub-contractors, catering to the principal exporters involved, appeared to have given the job to the refugee families as a gesture of providing employment, he added.

Code of conduct

Tirupur vendors, working with major global garment retailers, are strictly bound by the code of conduct in their trade practices, the implementation of which comes under the scanner of the latter’s compliance auditors visiting the Tirupur factories periodically.

The code of compliance insists uponamong other things, a strict ‘no’ to engaging child labour at any stage of garment production and fair labour practices as demanded by the laws of the land where the factories are situated.

The issue of child labour in the Tirupur knitwear industry used to be a running topic in 1990s when the knitwear manufacturers associations and the Coimbatore district administration took up vigorous campaigns to spread awareness among the units against employing child labour.

No child labour

“This has paid off as none of the major exporting units today employ child labour in Tirupur.

“But the same can’t be said of small time sub-contracting firms which still are seen engaging children at some stage of production,” feels Mr A. Aloysius, head of the local voluntary body, Social Awareness and Voluntary Education.

One also can’t ignore the undercurrent behind the issue of child labour being raked up, says Mr Aloysius who is of the view that often it is used to fuel trade war among the global competitors. As part of eradicating child labour, major global retailers and garment labels do sponsor schools in Tirupur which are run in association with their local vendors.

Among the global garment retail chains that are associated with such sponsored assistance for the children and women in Tirupur knitwear cluster are the European brand Switcher, Migros, Mothercare and C and A.

Major player

Primark, which has opted not to identify the three Tirupur units found flouting its code of ethics, is a major player in sourcing supplies out of Tirupur and the annual volume of merchandise sourced from the region by the company is said to be over Rs 400 crore.

More Stories on : Knitwear & Hosiery | Children & Parenting | Tamil Nadu

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