Panelists: Ashley Saxby, Ashmita Sharma, Abiramy Sivalogananthan and Nandita Shivakumar (Asia Floor Wage Alliance)
Where: Live on LUMS Facebook

In this talk, the panelists highlighted how COVID-19 has intervened in unanticipated ways across all sectors, with devastating impacts for the women workers who dominate the Asian garment industry. Across Asia—which accounts for 60% of the 40 million garment workers worldwide—women workers have been left in desperate circumstances requiring immediate and long-term responses. Women garment workers—including those who have returned to work and those who are unable to do so— face a spectrum of Gender-Based Violence and Harassment (GBVH), including forms of violence that inflict physical, mental, sexual, and economic harm. They further discussed the reasons why governments and brands have failed to avert and relieve this urgent humanitarian crisis and specifically have failed to include a gender lens even in limited response.

The panel provided a detailed overview of GBVH in garment supply chains, particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic. It also laid out critical actions needed from global fashion brands and governments going forward to mitigate the human rights impact in the short term and to transform supply chains going forward.