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The joint letter comes after prolongued talks between Ver.di and Zara in Germany, which centered on how to develop a good relationship between the company and its employees. In this unprecendented move Zara Germany has shown great will and active support of the global agreement which the mother company Inditex signed last year at the UNI Commerce Global Conference in Dublin.



The letter explains how the agreement ensures that Inditex as a group will respect the core ILO conventions including the right for freedom of association, and establishes the link between the mother company and the brand:



"The basic idea behind this agreement was to send out a strong message that the Inditex company recognises the rights of its own workers as well as those of its suppliers. In the same way as Inditex cooperates with UNI on the world stage, so too would ZARA Germany and ver.di like to inform you that they intend to apply this global agreement."



This link is of great importance since one of the most common obstacles UNI Commerce faces is the constant denial by multinational companies' head office of any responsibility of the actions of its subsidiaries, especially when it comes to franchisees. Though a company's business model may be legal and therefore technically the company's or the group's head office may not be culpable, to UNI Commerce it seems clear that when a company accepts the profit from a subsidiary then it needs to take an interest in how that profit is made.



You can read the letter by clicking here:



You can read more about Inditex and UNI Commerce's work with the company on our Multinational and Social Dialogue pages.