RMG owners propose Tk 10,400 as minimum wage for workers
Staff Reporter :
The representative of the country’s ready-made garments (RMG) workers proposed Tk 20,393 as monthly minimum wages, while owners want to pay Tk10,400.
Both the representatives of the workers and the owner placed the proposals to the Minimum Wage Board Chairman Liaquat Ali Mollah at his office in the city on Sunday.
The board will hold the next meeting to finalize the monthly minimum wages on November 1.
The current minimum wage of Tk8,000 was set in 2018 and the new minimum wage is expected to come into effect from December this year.
Followed by receiving the proposals, Liaquat Ali Mollah said that they will further discuss the proposals from both the parties and then finalize the minimum wage which will be beneficial for both sides.
“In this regard, the board will hold the next meeting on November 1 to finalize the minimum monthly wages for the RMG workers,” he added.
Mollah also said that as there is a big gap between the proposals of both the parties, they asked both the parties to come up with a reasonable proposal through negotiations, which will help facilitate the penultimate decision.
Asked about the proposal, workers’ representative Sirajul Islam Rony said that they have given a proposal after extensively analyzing a lot of data with regards to the current context.
“We want more, but considering the current industry capacity and global situation, we proposed the least minimum in our demand,” he said, adding, “Along with the wage proposal, we have placed 13 points to improve the living standards of the workers.”
The points include 61 per cent of basic wages, gratuity system, rationing, grading system reform, education allowance for children, increase in annual increment rate and many other welfare clauses.
“If the proposed wages are implemented by ensuring all the benefits, hopefully there will not be too much hardshipfor the workers,” Rony added.
On the other hand, owner’s representative and former BGMEA President Md Siddiqur Rahman said, “We handed over the proposal to the board chairman as per the decision of the previous meeting.”
“We have taken into account the global economy, capacity of the manufacturers, and international trade scenarios in our proposal,” he added.
The Russia-Ukraine war started before the world economy could recover from the stagnation caused by Covid-19 which made the global economy again volatile and witnessed a hike in the price of energy, fuel and gas prices which affected the industries as well as the lives of the workers.
“We have made our proposal by taking all things into consideration.
There is a gap in the proposals of both the parties. Now we have to reduce the gap,” he added.
Meanwhile, leaders from various trade unions related to the RMG sector rejected both the proposals, saying it was completely unrealistic.
They chanted slogans outside of the board office and demanded wages ranging from Tk23,000 to Tk25,000.
Recently, the Centre for Policy Dialogue (CPD) proposed Tk17,568 as the minimum monthly wage for RMG workers.
Bangladesh pays one of the lowest monthly wages to its RMG workers while China pays a minimum $161 in RMG worker wages, India $165, Vietnam $191, Pakistan $110, and Cambodia $200.
