Rebuilding life after Rana Plaza: Stories of survivors
Two years after the tragic collapse of the Rana Plaza garment factory in Bangladesh, the ILO has helped many survivors get back on their feet and back to work, two of whom have opened their own successful businesses and are thinking big for the future.
Badly injured while helping to rescue fellow workers from the rubble of Rana Plaza, Shahjahan Selim is now permanently disabled. Through ILO medical and business skills assistance Selim has overcome adversity to open a small shop which after just one year of operation has grown to twice its original size. ILO support to Selim was provided through a programme funded by Canada, the Netherlands and the United Kingdom.
The New Life Factory feels good from the moment you step in the door. Six women are sewing, talking and smiling while two young men are sorting fabrics on a table covered in brightly coloured material. There is a peaceful, determined hum in the warm, summer air rising up to the bamboo ceiling.
“After the Rana Plaza collapse, I decided to open my own factory, a different sort of factory. One where all the workers could be owners and all the profits could be shared,” says Naseer. “One that employed me and other survivors, but also one that could eventually grow big enough to employ all the survivors. The building would not rise above one storey and we would not need strict production targets. When I received the compensation money, I started the factory, and in just a year and a half our two secondhand machines have already grown to eight machines.”
Naseer is just 27 years old and is one of two owners of New Life. The other owner is his friend Jahangir. Naseer and Jahangir are both survivors of Rana Plaza, and the six women that they now employ are also all survivors. Naseer says that the community has embraced what they are trying to do.
“Buyers have been really supportive of us. They have agreed to pay us in advance because they know we don’t have the capital to cover the costs otherwise. All our orders come from the Savar Centre at the moment, from the Polybiddud market. The margins are not bad - we get 180 BDT on average for an item, and it is sold at around 220 BDT in the market.”
The six women currently employed in New Life had tried to return to work in traditional garment factories but were not able to handle the production targets.
“When Rana Plaza collapsed, I was just two months pregnant,” says Firoza. “Now my son is almost two years old, and he comes into the factory all the time. I like working here, no one yells at me, it is not stressful and I want to do the work because I am not stressed or pushed. It is peaceful. We do not need targets, we just get there, slowly, slowly.”
Naseer runs the factory as a cooperative, paying everybody at the same rate, saying this gives everyone the ownership needed to make New Life a success.
“We are all like brothers and sisters in the factory. Even when we have 1000 workers, this will be the same. All of us are working as workers, and all the profits are used to improve the factory. 7000 BDT is what we are paying our workers, and what Jahanghir and I are also paying ourselves. Some of the time we do not reach our targets, but when that happens, we all just automatically work harder to make up for it. I do not have to push. Everyone has their own responsibility and they feel ownership over what they do or do not produce. We are all poor. If we do not work, we cannot eat so we all want the factory to succeed.”
With the help of ILO-supported career counselling, psychological support sessions and self-help groups, Naseer has solid goals for New Life and has developed strategies for reaching those goals.
“We will buy a generator soon, as soon as we have made some more money, as summer is coming soon and there will be more regular power cuts,” says Naseer. “We will also reduce the size of the cutting and pattern making table to make space for some more machines. In five years we will have two lines, which means 64 machines.”
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