Worker Rights Consortium

10/09/2025

Thulsi Narayanasamy, our Director of International Advocacy, spoke on the panel “Too Hot To Fashion?” alongside Clean Clothes Campaign and Solidarity Center during , exploring what a looks like in the garment sector.

We emphasized that ensuring fair purchasing practices and living wages for garment workers is essential to addressing both the root causes and the negative impacts of fashion on the climate crisis.

As Thulsi noted on the panel: “I hadn’t expected to have such an enthusiastic audience when discussing why the fundamental shifts required in the structure of clothes manufacturing to ensure living wages and decent work are the same shifts needed to reduce the negative impact of fashion on the climate. That has given me great hope.”

She added: “You can’t have environmental sustainability while abusing workers’ rights, and you can’t protect garment workers’ rights while ignoring fashion’s climate footprint—the causes of both are inextricably linked, and the solutions must be, too.”

Read more in Vogue Business's coverage of Climate Week:
http://bit.ly/47bUTFJ

President Trump’s anti-ESG backlash sparked fears of a muted and despondent New York Climate Week. The reality was anything but.

10/06/2025

We recently took part in an engaging panel titled “Too Hot To Fashion" alongside Clean Clothes Campaign, Katalyst Initiative, and Solidarity Center during on what a looks like in the garment sector. We emphasized that ensuring fair purchasing practices and a living wage for garment workers will address both the root causes and negative impact of fashion on the climate crisis.

As our Director of Advocacy Thulsi Narayanasamy affirms in this clip: “What is a way for us to tackle both the impacts and root causes of the climate crisis as they relate to the [garment] industry at the same time? The fundamental shifts required in the structure of the manufacturing supply chain to ensure a living wage are the same shifts needed to reduce the massive negative impact of manufacturing when it comes to the climate.”

Issues like heat stress become the result of a great number of violations in garment factories, including increased rates of gender based violence and harassment, health and safety issues, wage theft, and the denial of workers’ right to organize.

09/25/2025

We are pleased to report that Lucky Brand has made a humanitarian contribution of $500,000 to assist garment workers at the Industrial Hana factory in Guatemala, which was, prior to its closure, a subcontractor for one of Lucky Brand’s direct apparel suppliers.

The Industrial Hana factory closed in October 2023, without paying approximately $1.5 million in legally due severance to its 246 former employees.

Prior to obtaining Lucky Brand’s commitment of funds to assist the Guatemalan workers, the WRC secured and distributed contributions to the factory’s former employees totaling $1,000,000, from two other brands whose apparel was also made at the factory, American Eagle Outfitters (AEO) and Puma. The impact on workers of the factory’s failure to pay their legally due severance, and the facility’s subcontracted production for Lucky Brand—a subsidiary of Catalyst Brands, whose principal owners include Authentic Brands Group and Shein—were also reported by the US NGO Partners for Dignity & Rights (formerly NESRI) on multiple episodes of the podcast, Art of Citizenry.

The funds contributed by Lucky Brand will be distributed to the Industrial Hana workers next month.

Worker Rights Consortium

09/15/2025

In Bangkok at ?

Please join our civil society only session tomorrow:

Turning Law into Justice: Leveraging Due Diligence for Worker Remedy
📅16 September 2025 | 10:30 - 12:00 ICT
📍UN Conference Centre | Conference Room 1
Registration (optional): https://www.workersrights.org/2025-united-nations-responsible-business-and-human-rights-forum-turning-law-into-justice-leveraging-due-diligence-for-worker-remedy/

As the Asia region moves towards the creation of new corporate accountability legal instruments and explores corporate mandatory due diligence measures, there is an opportunity to take stock of how these could practically support supply chain workers to achieve remedy for rights violations.

Drawing on casework by the independent monitoring organisation, Worker Rights Consortium (WRC) and its partners, this practical workshop will examine how innovative accountability strategies in contexts of lax labor law enforcement have not only delivered justice in cases of severe rights violations but have also contributed to scaling the impact of remedy, strengthened institutions, and pushed back against shrinking civic space. This approach has enabled the WRC to recover over $150 million for workers in unpaid wage and severance dues alone.

The practical benefit of new laws for workers depends on the strength of such laws and the ability for such laws to be enforced, and much can be learned from decades of work in the apparel sector that has focused on utilising national legislation and corporate due diligence commitments.

In this interactive workshop, participants will learn from apparel sector case studies and be guided in reflecting on opportunities and challenges in their own sectors and countries of focus in relation to how to leverage existing corporate commitments, national legislation, and due diligence requirements. Participants will also identify elements necessary for inclusion in forthcoming corporate accountability policies to help ensure those will be effective at uncovering violations, protecting workers, and remedying abuses.

03/13/2025

Join Us at the 69th UN Commission on the Status of Women Parallel Event

The WRC, along with Asia Floor Wage Alliance (AFWA) and Global Labor Justice, invites you to:
Parallel Session: Women Workers Stand up to Workplace Violence and Harassment – The Central Java Agreement for Gender Justice

📅 Monday, March 17 | 2:30–4 p.m.
📍 Salvation Army (Lower Level), 221 E. 52nd St., New York, NY 10022

Join us for presentations on the groundbreaking supply chain agreement, the Central Java Gender Justice Agreement, establishing a union-led program to prevent and eliminate workplace gender-based violence and harassment. The Agreement, signed among four unions, Korean multinational Ontide, and global labor organizations and complemented by a commitment from sportswear brand Fanatics, covers the 6,250 workers at Ontide’s two factories in Indonesia. The Central Java Agreement incorporates key definitions and elements from the ILO Convention 190 on Violence and Harassment in the world of work.

The session will include interviews with women workers employed at the Ontide factories, union leaders, and a panel discussion with representatives from GLJ, AFWA, and the WRC.

🎤 Panelists:
Jessica Champagne, Deputy Director of Strategy & Field Operations, WRC
Jennifer (JJ) Rosenbaum, Executive Director, GLJ
Anannya Bhattacharjee, International Coordinator, AFWA
Moderator: Rola Abimourched, Deputy Director of Investigations & Gender Equity, WRC

Register here for the NGO forum at CSW; this requirement is required to attend all parallel sessions: https://ngocsw69forum.events.whova.com/registration/

03/12/2025

Women Garment Workers Win Landmark Gender Justice Agreement

After years of gender-based violence and harassment, women workers in Central Java have won a historic agreement protecting 6,250 garment workers producing clothing, including Nike licensed goods, for Fanatics. The Central Java Agreement for Gender Justice was negotiated by SPN, SPSI, and KASBI at PT Batang Apparel Indonesia, and SPSI at PT Semarang Garment Indonesia, with support from the Worker Rights Consortium (WRC), Asia Asia Floor Wage Alliance (AFWA), and Global Labor Justice—all of whom are signatories.

A 2021 WRC investigation exposed systemic abuse that brand audits failed to prevent. Now, this union-led Agreement creates a program to eliminate GBVH and ensure worker safety.

Worker Rights Consortium