Bangladesh forms wage board as garment protests shut factories

Bangladesh announced a six-member wage board on Sunday to review garment workers' pay and urged employees to return to work, but protests demanding higher wages continued across major industrial areas, disrupting transport and factory operations.

Workers want a minimum monthly wage of 30,000 taka ($245), more than double the current 12,500 taka. They say the cost of food, housing, transport and healthcare has sharply reduced what their pay can buy, the Kathmandu Post reported.

The ready-made garment sector is the world's largest after China's. It employs about 4 million workers, generates more than 80 percent of Bangladesh's export earnings and contributes roughly 10 percent of gross domestic product, according to the Kathmandu Post. It supplies clothing to many leading Western brands.

Labour and Employment Minister Ariful Haque Chowdhury said the wage board was formed after discussions with workers' representatives and industry leaders, and urged workers to resume work. He warned that prolonged disruption could delay export shipments and payments from international buyers, creating difficulties for manufacturers and workers alike.

Thousands of garment workers staged fresh demonstrations on Sunday despite the announcement. Police used tear gas and water cannon on workers who had blocked a busy intersection in Dhaka, and some protesters threw bricks at officers, police said.

Hundreds of workers blocked a major highway in Gazipur, on the outskirts of the capital, disrupting transport in one of the country's key industrial belts. Owners shut 25 to 30 factories there, and Border Guard Bangladesh personnel were deployed to maintain order, Gazipur Industrial Police Superintendent Mohammad Amjad Hossain said.

The unrest follows protests in Ashulia, another major garment manufacturing hub outside Dhaka, where dozens of factories suspended operations on Saturday after workers demanded higher pay, the Kathmandu Post reported.

Manufacturers said the sector faces rising production costs, periodic gas and electricity shortages, and uncertainty in energy markets linked to tensions in the Middle East, the Kathmandu Post reported.

Al Jazeera, Arab News, Hindustan Times and AsiaOne all reported the formation of the wage board, with no disagreement among them on the sequence of events. None of the reports gave a figure for workers injured or detained in Sunday's clashes.