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There has been an increased focus and heightened activities to organize employees into trade unions targeting the Ready Made Garment [RMG] sector in Bangladesh. Rana plaza disaster triggered the global trade unions and like-minded civil society to double up efforts to improve the fire safety standards and employee welfare in the RMG sector.

The government of Bangladesh is now diversifying economic activities to include the other potential value adding services sectors such as ICTS. The country is enjoying a completive advantage in attracting the BPO and Contact Centre businesses with many MNC Mobile Telecoms have increased their presence in Bangladesh.

Franziska Korn Resident Representative of FES of Bangladesh inaugurated the two days National Network Meeting in Dhaka held at the Radisson Hotel on  2-3 November 2016.   UNI Professionals & Managers group is implementing a series of capacity development activities in South Asia under “Bridging Implementation Gaps in ILS and Decent Work Agenda” supported by the FES under its Global Trade Union Program. Franziska welcomed similar programs to Bangladesh targeting the non-RMG sector as there is an urgent need to strengthen the trade unions in services sectors as many professionals and managers are experiencing decent work deficiencies in Bangladesh.

There were 36 participants including Engineers at the networking meeting. The majority of the participants were from the ICTS sector of Bangladesh. It was reported that the management of the mobile operators is hostile towards trade unions and union activist in Bangladesh. At the network meeting, participants shared their experiences in overcoming the challenges and used the forum to instill confidence amongst them.  

Reaching out to Professionals & Managers (Engineers) to collaborate with trade union movement to secure their rights collectively was the key objective of the network meeting. Professionals leading the way in business, state-owned institutions to comply with international standards and best practices for sustainable development growths were extensively discussed in groups at the meeting.

A number of female participants were few, yet those women actively participated and demonstrated their passion for securing rights through collective means.The two days meeting was facilitated  by Jayasri Priyalal, Regional Director for UNI Apro Finance, and P&M group activities, Rajendra Acharya UNI Apro Asst. Regional Secretary and Alex Hogback , Senior Coordinator, UNI ICTS Switzerland.

On 3rd November 2016, Institution of Engineers Bangladesh invited UNI Apro to conduct a joint seminar for their members. IEB invited  Honorable Sahajahan Khan Minister of Shipping of the Government of Bangladesh and  Dr. Sahajahan Mahamood, Chairman of the Telecommunication Regulatory Commission as a guest to the seminar; the importance of trade unions as credible social partners was re-emphasized inviting their interventions to arrest management hostilities towards trade unions and trade union leaders.