Benefits for Business and Workers project launched

Sponsored by the UK’s Department for International Development (DFID), Benefits for Business and Workers (BBW) Project was launched in the capital on 2nd December at the British High Commission. 

This was the second phase of the project, which so far has been supported by leading UK retailers such as Arcadia, Marks & Spencer, Mothercare, New Look, Sainsbury’s and Tesco. Mementos were handed over to these retailers for their tremendous support.

According to the figures shared by Mothercare, the retail industry creates some 25 million jobs world-wide, making it the second largest employment generating industry after agriculture. Happy workforce it said, results in better productivity.
The BBW project is managed by Impactt UK and Rajesh Bheda Consulting (RBC). According to Impactt, BBW aims to boost competitiveness of garment industry in India and Bangladesh with focus on responsible manufacturing resulting in improved social standards in factories, improved worker loyalty, efficiency and quality.

During the event the participating retailers and factories in the pilot phase such as from Tirupur, shared the dramatic improvements achieved in productivity, quality, labour turnover and decreasing absenteeism. A Srinivasan, administrative manager, SCM Garments, Tirupur said, “Within few months we have seen the change in out factory. The BBW team comes and listens to one and all, understands our problem and give simple solutions. We have really been able to deal with the major issue that labour absenteeism was.”

Rosey Hurst, founder and Director of Impactt said, “The RBC and Impactt collaboration aims at improving wages of labourers, improve productivity, reduce wastage. Right now we are covering six factories in India and four in Bangladesh. Some of the benefits that these factories have seen are better outgoing quality, on-time deliveries, less costs, profit sharing, stress and overtime of the workers going down and reduced absenteeism.” In the next stage the project plans to cover at least 60 factories in India.

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