Across all 18 factories studied for this report, the Fair Labor Association (FLA) found that not a single garment worker among the more than 6,000 whose wages were studied was earning income even close to a living wage, measured against any living wage benchmark. While the report found the minimum wage in Banglesh set below the World Bank poverty line, buyers and suppliers need not wait on government action to begin working collaboratively on higher wages.

The Fair Labor Association (FLA), Fair Wear Foundation, Social Accountability International, and five affiliates sourcing from Cambodia have written to the Cambodian prime minister, expressing concern about recent developments related to the country’s minimum wage law, arbitration council, trade union law, and commitment to workers’ freedom of association.

The World Bank reports that among the 2.1 billion people worldwide estimated to be living in poverty, "a vast majority ... live in rural areas ... mostly employed in the agriculture sector." To catalyze progress on fair compensation for farmers and workers involved in agricultural supply chains, FLA assessors began collecting information from workers in 2015 on wages earned at the farm-level in seven countries where the FLA conducts agricultural monitoring.

In August 2016, FLA Participating Company Syngenta was scheduled to begin the first phase of its pilot project for ensuring minimum wage payments to seed production workers, as a step toward fair compensation at Syngenta-supplying farms in India.

The FLA and its stakeholders (buyers, suppliers, labor rights advocates, and universities) are part of an effort to improve compensation for workers in global supply chains. As a contribution to this effort, the FLA presents here a first-of-its-kind report detailing worker compensation data collected in 2015 by the FLA in 124 mainly apparel and footwear factories in 21 countries.