garment workers

April 24, 2014

“Give me the chainsaw”- How one mother survived Rana Plaza

Last year, I met a few of the Bangladeshi garment workers who survived Rana Plaza. I heard their stories, and today, on the one-year anniversary, I feel the need to share one of them. This is really a story of mothers and daughters. A year ago today, more than 1,134 Bangladeshi garment workers went to work and didn’t come home. Fearful of losing their jobs, they entered a building they knew was unsafe. They died crushed by the rubble.
April 24, 2014

“My daughter used to work so hard”

The woman was crying and saying something in an incomprehensible manner. I was sitting there, a couple of feet away, wondering what I had said wrong. The man sitting beside her didn’t react to her sudden burst of tears – she is his wife and he has gotten used to seeing her like this. My colleague Lusana and the BBC documentary producer Sarah both went quiet for a while.
June 25, 2013

Stemming the tide of uncertainty and vulnerability

Uncertainty and vulnerability are hallmarks of life for the world's poor, in low and high income countries. Collective action helps on different levels, across different dimensions of life, to overcome.