Dhaka (ILO News) –On 20 February 2023, Gen Nakatani, Special Advisor to Japan’s PM on international human rights issues, inspected garment factory in Savar near Dhaka on his visit to Bangladesh to attend a workshop co-organised by the International Labour Organization (ILO) Office for Japan and the Japan External Trade Organization (JETRO).

The ILO is implementing Building Responsible Value Chains in Asia, a project funded by Japan’s Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, thereby supporting companies in four Asian countries, namely, Bangladesh, Cambodia, Vietnam, and Japan, to conduct human rights due diligence to determine and address the risks of human rights violations in their business activities and supply chains.

In Bangladesh, working with Better Work and the ILO Country Office for Bangladesh, Dhaka, the ILO assists garment factories, governmental and industrial organisations, and labour unions not only at the enterprise level but also at the industry and national levels following the guidelines on human rights due diligence and the international labour standards. They are working to encourage social dialogues between workers and management and to build the capacity of stakeholders, bringing about continuous improvement in human rights and working conditions and promoting decent work.

Mr Nakatani toured the factory, attentively listening to the management’s explanations about their plant-wide human rights initiatives, sometimes stopping to ask workers on duty about their work environment.