Every female garment worker in Bangladesh has potential to grow: Netherlands ambassador

Being a former garment worker, the Netherlands Ambassador in Dhaka Leoni Cuelenaere believes every female garment worker in Bangladesh has the potential to grow and have access to promotions.

“Not every female garment worker can become an ambassador, but I do believe that everyone has the potential to grow,” Cuelenaere says.

“With the right kind of support and empowerment, we can help the RMG workers of Bangladesh to fulfil their potential.”

She was speaking at a photo exhibition on Wednesday at her residence co-organised by the Netherlands embassy in Dhaka and the International Labour Organisation or ILO ahead of the International Women’s Day on Thursday.

Titled ‘Beyond the Sewing Machine’, the photo exhibitions portrayed how the ILO’s ‘Better Work’ project has helped female workers to develop skills and access promotion, and delivered more for their employers and themselves.

The ambassador said she was a former garment worker when she was 18.

“After I left the RMG factory, I was fortunate enough to get the opportunity to focus on my academic career. I became a teacher and later a diplomat and an ambassador,” Cuelenaere said.

“Being a woman did not always make things easier. Throughout my career, even as an ambassador, I have encountered my fair share of gender-based prejudice. Yet, I have always refused to see myself or women in general as pitiful in any way. I make it a point to always fight inequality,” she said.

“Unfortunately, the world is not an equal place. Some like me have more opportunities than others. The average RMG worker in Bangladesh, regardless of their gender, does not get the chance to study.

“I believe, however, that people have a choice. That they always have an opportunity to improve their lives and livelihoods,” she said.

The ILO’s ‘Better Work’ programme equip female RMG workers with the skills required for a supervisory or management position.

In less than two months after the initiative started, the ambassador said 49 female operators had already been promoted to supervisory positions.

The Netherlands, the UK and Canada support that project.

ILO’s Chief Technical Advisor Snehal V Soneji told bdnews24.com the UN agency along with the employers, workers and government try to break the power structure whereby women can be supervisors in a factory.

He explained: “In Bangladesh, everybody knows a large number of garment workers is women. But they don’t realise that supervisors are men, the quality manager is men, and floor managers are men. Women are not in a position of power. They are at the bottom of the production chain.”

Soneji said the photos at the exhibition depicted “women in action, women being empowered, women in charge, women involved in what they work, women representing other women..…that’s all the points of the international women day.”

“Every single picture in the exhibition is women essentially acting out their empowerment. Essentially being seen that they are involved in things that only empowered person can do,” he added.

The theme of this year’s women day is “press for progress” towards ensuring gender equality.