DHAKA: Bangladesh's garment wage board agreed on Wednesday to raise minimum pay in the key export sector, but details remained scarce and it was unclear whether the deal would end five days of protests and clashes.
Tens of thousands of workers marched through industrial areas on Wednesday morning demanding higher wages, with some throwing bricks, torching police vehicles and erecting barricades, as police fired tear gas to disperse crowds.
Protests eased in the afternoon after an agreement was announced, but there was no immediate indication that workers would return to factories and restart production.
Many workers were still unsure what the announcement meant, union leader Kamrul Hasan of the Ekota Garments Sramik Federation said, adding that most "did not know" how the wage board worked and were asking on social media whether their pay had increased.
Mahmudul Hasan, Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association (BGMEA) president, said workers should go back to work.
"The unrest should subside, as progress is evident now," Hasan told AFP. "We do not want our factories to remain closed, but we had no choice because of the unrest."
The South Asian nation of 170 million people is the world's second-biggest garment exporter behind China, making clothes for some of the world's best-known brands.
The dispute reflects longstanding tensions in an industry that employs more than four million people but has been dogged by complaints over pay, working conditions and labour rights.
The board, comprising representatives of employers and workers, was set up by the government on Sunday to negotiate a pay rise. It did not specify the size of the increase.
'Working together'
"The workers have been demanding a wage increase by December so that they can receive their revised salaries in January," said Babul Akter, the workers' representative on the board.
"The representative of the factory owners on the wage board agreed, too. We agreed on this point... We are working together."
The announcement came after unrest in major industrial centres including Gazipur, Mirpur, Narayanganj and Savar.
In Savar, angry workers torched police vehicles and injured a police officer before the deal was announced, Dhaka's police superintendent Shamima Parvin said.
"Around 30,000 to 40,000 workers came from both sides and attacked the police, and the police, in response, tried to resist the attack," Parvin said.
"The protesters torched a police vehicle, and the officer-in-charge of Savar police station was seriously injured."
Workers say the rising cost of food, housing, transport and healthcare has eroded their purchasing power in a country with eight percent inflation.
They are demanding a minimum monthly wage of 30,000 taka ($240), a 140 percent increase on the current 12,500 taka.
"We will complete our work by December so that workers can receive their increased salaries by January," said ABM Shamsuddin, the BGMEA representative on the wage board.
Bangladesh's garment industry generates around four-fifths of the country's export earnings, worth up to $38 billion.
The United States is its biggest individual market, while the European Union is its largest trading bloc.
Workers make clothes for companies that range from Fruit of the Loom to Levi Strauss and VF Corp, whose brands include Vans, Timberland and The North Face.
Syed Sultan Uddin Ahmed, executive director of the Bangladesh Institute of Labour Studies, said the government should take immediate steps to inform workers about the developments.
"The government can form a tripartite arrangement involving representatives of the government, factory owners and workers to explain how the wage board will work. That is how the unrest could be managed, not through coercion," he said.