This petition is run by Massimo Esposito

Why is this important?

The textile industry, clothing and footwear, employs over 75 Million people worldwide, whose two thirds are women, especially in developing countries.
When we buy a t-Shirt in Europe, it may have been sewed in Cambodia, by having used fabrics, which have been made in China with cotton, which has been harvested in Uzbekistan and colored with Indian products.
The textile producers in developing countries are constantly exposed to aggressive purchase practice of the international wholesale and retail trade.
The global segmentation of supply chains moves the violation risks of human rights, occupational safety, environmental impact and local communities from rich countries to less developed countries, how it has even been reported by a recent inquest. (RAI REPORT “Pulp Fashion” 3.12.2018).
After a sequence of tragic events happened in every Asian country, whose symbol is the Rana Plaza, (a 7 floors building, which suddenly collapsed in Dhaka (Bangladesh) and where over 1100 people died and 2500 were injured.) the awareness and the attention about the working conditions, which clothing and footwear are produced in, have grown worldwide.
The choices induced in consumers in Europe may have consequences, which heavily affect workers’ lives, the environment and the communities in different countries worldwide.
Some international institutions and governments try too shyly to limit these distortions:
• The OECD (Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development) has published a “Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible supply chain in the garment and footwear sector”.
• The EU Parliament have asked the commission to arrange a directive proposal compelling the occidental clothing and footwear brands to have more cogent third party control on producers in extra-European countries.
• France has introduced by law the Devoir du Surveillance.
• UK has introduced the anti-slavery law.
• Canada has forbidden by law the importation of products, for whom there is a doubt of juvenile work purpose along the supply chain.
• In the Netherlands and in Germany only simple agreements, not binding a sustainable textile sector, are worth.
It is necessary to raise much more the threshold of normative controls because:
1. The voluntary initiatives for the sustainability of global supply chain in clothing sector have already widely demonstrated not to be sufficient to face the violations of human rights and work;
2. The economic development must go hand in hand with social justice and a reduction of imbalances deriving from the complexity and the global segmentation of supply chains;
3. The clothing sector plays an important role in the development of high intensity work activities in emerging economies, in particular in Asia.
4. It is necessary to launch a reduction process of the gap between the existing norms and the working conditions in occidental and developing countries;
5. It is absolutely priority to promote dignified working conditions for workers, the environment and local communities, promoting the protection of human rights, sustainability, traceability, transparency of purchase chains and the aware consumption;
6. The responsibility must be in charge of all actors along the whole supply chain, including the subcontractors. So, the EU must stronger support the already proposed writing of a treaty of United Nation about enterprises and human rights, to improve the responsibility of enterprises.
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THEREFORE, WITH THIS PETITION:
We ask THE CANDIDATES AND PARTIES to the next European Parliament to TAKE ON A PUBLIC FORMAL COMMITMENT to regulate the high work intensity sectors exposed to the fragmentation of supply chains worldwide, promoting a DIRECTIVE founded on:

THE OBLIGATION OF CONTROL ALONG THE SUPPLY CHAINS
By means on introduction of specific reference laws imposing an effective obligation of control and juridical responsibility on all the social perspectives of the whole supply chain (worker rights, women and minors‘ protection, occupational safety, protection of environment), recalling international documents, as well as an effective control on the traceability of products from raw materials to the final product, including a transparent data collection, tools for consumers’ information, code of conduct, excellence labels and fair-trade programs in line with the principles and guidelines for international institutions (United Nations, ILO, OECD, UNICEF).
Such controls ought to be entrusted certified independent entities taking on by law the responsibility to carry out inspections in compliance to international norms with jurisdiction, integrity and impartiality;
THE INFORMATION TO FINAL CONSUMERS
Compulsorily guaranteeing the right to a complete, clear and reliable consumers’ information about the sustainability, the products’ source and the conditions in factories producing them;
THE FINANCIAL MEASURES
Increasing loans in favor of the research and the development in recycling sector to guarantee alternative and sustainable sources of raw materials for clothing and rare wares’ sector.
THE INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION
Concluding the international agreements framework to promote workers’ rights in supply chains of multinational enterprises, even by commercial agreements between EU and Extra EU countries with binding, transparent and measurable sections about sustainable development, with the commitment to introduce a clause promoting the ratification and the fulfillment of ILO’s conventions and the agenda for the dignified work.


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TO KNOW MORE
1. http://www.treccani.it/enciclopedia/unione-europea-commercio-internazionale-e-diritti-umani
2. Fabrizio Marrella - Unione Europea, commercio internazionale e diritti umani - Libro dell'anno del Diritto 2014
3. Risoluzione dell’Assemblea generale delle Nazioni Unite sui Principi di diritto internazionale concernenti le relazioni amichevoli e la cooperazione tra gli Stati, 2625 (XXV) del 24.10.1970, (A/RES/2625 (XXV).
4. http://eurlex.europa.eu/LexUriServ/LexUriServ.do?uri=OJ:L:2012:303:0001:0082:IT:PDF.
5. Galgano F., Cassese S., Tremonti G.,Treu T. - Nazioni senza ricchezza, ricchezze senza Nazioni - Bologna, 1993.
6. Benedek W., De Feyter K., Marrella F. - Economic Globalisation and Human Rigths - Cambridge, 2007
7. Perulli A., Marrella F. - Manifesto di Venezia per la regolazione della globalizzazione economica. La globalizzazione virtuosa - in Riv. it. dir. lav., 2009
8. Reg. CE n. 1236/2005 del Consiglio Europeo 27.6.2005, in GUCE L 200, 30.7.2005
9. RAI Report 3/12/2018 - Pulp Fashion – Servizio di Emanuele Bellano
10. Giuseppe Iorio - Made in Italy? Il lato oscuro della moda - Ed. Castelvecchi 2018
11. www.tio.ch/ticino/politica/1340159/calcoliamo-i-reali-costi-di-delocalizzazione
12. www.huffingtonpost.it/mauro-rosati/marchi-privati-del-food-e-il-pericolo-delle-delocalizzazioni-in-italia_a_23593375/
13. www.ilsole24ore.com/art/impresa-e-territori/2018-06-13/delocalizzare-soltanto-10percento-va-asia
14. www.professionefinanza.com/globalizzazione-nuova-fase-delocalizzazione
15. Relazione sull’iniziativa faro dell’UE nel settore abbigliamento 2016/2140 (INI) – commissione per lo sviluppo
16. D.Lgs 15/11/2017 n. 190 “disciplina sanzionatoria per la violazione di cui alla direttiva 94/11/CE, concernente l’etichettatura dei materiali usati nei principali componenti delle calzature destinate alla vendita al consumatore ed al regolamento (UE) n. 1007/2011 del Parlamento Europeo e del consiglio del 27/09/2011 relativo alla denominazione delle fibre tessili e all’etichettatura e al contrassegno della composizione fibrosa dei prodotti tessili.