Accord and Alliance have so far severed business relations with 217 Bangladeshi readymade garment factories on grounds of unsafe working conditions. Alliance is a coalition of North American retailers. Accord is a grouping of EU retailers. The groups are interested in structural, electrical and fire safety initiatives at the factories from where they procure products. They have conducted safety inspections at more than 2,600 factories in Bangladesh following the Rana Plaza building collapse in April 2013.

The Accord conducted initial safety assessment at 1,850 factories while the Alliance inspected 775 readymade garment units. During the inspection, Accord and Alliance referred 150 factories to a government-set review panel consisting of representatives from the government, Accord, Alliance, suggesting evacuation as the retailers’ inspection teams got critical findings in the units.

Out of the 150 factories, 39 were closed, 42 factories were partially closed and 69 factories were allowed to operate with some conditions. After completing the initial assessment the initiatives provided corrective action plans to the factory owners with certain timeframe to fix the safety faults. According to them most the factories remain behind schedule. Accord said a total of 207 factories completed all structural safety remediation. Alliance said 75 per cent of all safety issues including 68 per cent of all high priority issues were fixed in its listed factories.