CHENNAI:More than half the women
employed in Bangladesh''s garment industry endure spousal violence, which causes
depression and lower productivity at work, researchers said.Women''s employment
challenges the role of husbands in a patriarchal society, according to a new
study published by the International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research in
Bangladesh."Often, garment workers earn more than their husbands,"
said Ruchira Tabassum Naved, a co-author, by phone from the capital, Dhaka.
Some men feel humiliated when their wives become the main bread winners,
displacing them from their traditional position of dominance in the family."All
this usually gets expressed through perpetration of violence against these
women," Naved told the Thomson Reuters Foundation on Thursday. "The
urge to grab her savings and assets also result in violence."Bangladesh''s
garment sector, worth about $28 billion per year, employs 4 million people, nearly
80 per cent of them women.
The study found that 53 percent of female garment workers had been subjected to
spousal violence during the previous year, compared to a national average of 27
percent. Of those, 43 percent reported suffering from depression.Assaults
against female garment workers also take a financial toll on the industry."Violence
increases work-related stress which in turn leads to the development of
depression which in many cases, reduces productivity," said the study.
"Thus, violence incurs cost at individual, family and the garment sector
levels."Physical injuries may also affect a worker''s productivity. The
study found that female garment workers suffered injuries including broken ribs
and blindness.(Reporting by Anuradha Nagaraj, Editing by Jared Ferrie; Please
credit the Thomson Reuters Foundation, the charitable arm of Thomson Reuters,
that covers humanitarian news, women''s rights, trafficking and climate change.
Source: Prothom Alo, Bangladesh Friday, 19 January 2018