As the World Bank, the United Nations and other multilateral and bilateral donors work together to respond to the current economic crisis, the MFA Forum believes it can facilitate effective crisis response within the apparel sector by leveraging its proven ability to mobilize an extensive stakeholder network and its extensive knowledge of the sector. As such, the MFA Forum recently launched the Sustainable Apparel and Footwear Initiative (SAFI) at an IFC-hosted meeting in Washington, D.C. in May 2009. SAFI is a coordinated set of initiatives designed to promote rapid responses to the urgent needs presented by the current economic crisis and to orient stakeholders around solutions that will drive long-term, positive impacts and value for the industry.
The MFA Forum was established in the first quarter of 2004 and is an open network of companies, trade unions, non-governmental organizations, and international institutions promoting and working toward responsible competitiveness in the textile and garments industry. It was established in response to the growing need throughout the garment and textile industry to manage the responsible transition to a post-Multi-Fibre Arrangement (MFA) trading environment in order to avoid several possible dangers and threats -- including a negative impact on workers, communities and local and national economies in vulnerable countries. In addition, businesses and governments, as well as other institutions, would risk culpability for not preventing these negative impacts. Finally, both consequences would erode trust in the broader agenda of development through trade. The MFA Forum’s organizing principles are published in The Collaborative Framework for Guiding Post-MFA Actions.
Because the apparel and footwear sector is one of the single largest sources of manufacturing employment in developing countries, the effects of the global economic downturn are having a particularly devastating affect on workers and communities in these countries.
The apparel and footwear sector is composed predominantly of young women, who are often internal (and sometimes external) migrants working under precarious employment terms. According to the International Textile, Garment and Leatherworkers Federation (ITGLWF), approximately 11.5 million jobs have been lost in the sector already, with losses expected to increase by another 3 million over the next year unless swift action is taken to protect and promote employment in this critical sector. The disenfranchisement of millions from one of the few existing opportunities for unskilled women to enter the formal economy will reverse a decade of progress toward achieving the Millennium Development Goals.
There is an immediate and urgent need to design and implement interventions that keep as many of these women in the apparel sector employed and/or in a position to continue to provide critical resources for their families. In order to have an integrated and coordinated response, SAFI is focused on the following three work streams:
- Promoting Responsible Trade Finance. The MFA Forum recognizes the opportunity to utilize financing incentives to raise the standards of this industry both through providing liquidity in the short term to ‘good’ suppliers in need of credit to keep their businesses open, but also for the longer-term by providing a program for preferential terms incentives for best-in-class practices in the industry.
- Global Advocacy and Country execution of social protection programs. SAFI will mobilize its extensive networks for quick delivery and implementation of global information networks to provide immediate data and predictive mechanisms, influence best practices through Guidelines, and deliver on-the-ground support for the design and rapid mobilization of resources to deliver key programmes for crisis mitigation.
- Shape the development of a new model of competitiveness of the apparel and footwear industry through supporting productive and responsible growth in developing market consumption. This activity includes promoting research and investments for the global supply chains of the future and committing to discussions to promote a living wage.
Currently, the MFA Forum works in Bangladesh, Lesotho and Morocco. In addition, the Forum has a working group on issues in the Americas and has begun engaging in Mexico, Nicaragua and the Dominican Republic. A “critical issues” working group has also focused on responsible closures since mid-2006. In July 2008, the Responsible Transitions working group published the Responsible Transitions Guidelines – A process that for the first time brought together companies, trade unions, multilateral agencies, NGOs and multi-stakeholder initiatives to discuss the expectations for different actors regarding the mitigation of negative impacts to workers affected by large-scale retrenchment, either at the firm or country level. The Responsible Transitions Guidelines can be downloaded at http://mfa-forum.net/responsible_transitions.asp or the MFA Forum website http://mfa-forum.net.
For more information on SAFI or the MFA Forum, please contact: Sasha Radovich, Senior Manager, AccountAbility.
