Panel at UVA Explores Lessons from Bangladesh Rana Plaza Factory Collapse

Last year's Rana Plaza factory collapse in Bangladesh marked the worst disaster in the history of the garment industry. More than 1,100 people lost their lives. What is being done for the victims and their families, and what reforms are needed to make sure this never happens again?

To examine these questions, Pulitzer Center grantees Jason Motlagh and Ken Weiss are joined by Sajeda Amin, senior associate at the Population Council, and Suzanne Moomaw, associate professor at the University of Virginia School of Architecture, on Thursday, April 17 for a conversation on the lessons that can be learned from this tragedy. Paul Reyes, the Deputy Editor of Virginia Quarterly Review, will moderate the conversation.

For his project, "Bangladesh: The Real Cost of Fast Fashion," Motlagh traveled to Bangladesh to investigate the the systemic failures that led to the Rana Plaza building's collapse, exposing the dark side of the country's $20 billion-a-year export garment industry. His in-depth investigation is featured in the forthcoming issue of VQR.

In his reporting, Weiss examines the perspective of the Bangladeshi women who toil in sweatshop conditions, but find empowerment in an option that provides them with an income, however small, and a job to do. The factories have given the women a level of independence they would not be able to attain otherwise in Bangladesh, Weiss reports in his LA Times article, "Bangladesh Women Find Liberty in Hard Labor," part of his Pulitzer Center project "Beyond 7 Billion."

Sajeda Amin leads the Population Council's work on livelihoods for adolescent girls. She is a senior sociologist and demographer with decades of experience generating evidence on empowerment programs for girls and women. She also studies the role of work opportunities in girls' and women's lives. Before joining the Population Council in 1993, Amin was a research fellow at the Bangladesh Institute of Development Studies, in Dhaka.

Specializing in community and economic development at the local, regional and international scales, Suzanne Morse Moomaw continues to lead a distinguished career in the nonprofit and philanthropic worlds as well as academia. She is currently an associate professor, Urban and Environmental Planning, at the University of Virginia School of Architecture. Her books include Smart Communities: How Citizens and Local Leaders Can Use Strategic Thinking to Build a Brighter Future Second Edition (2014) and the forthcoming Competitive Global Communities: Using Innovation to Secure a Resilient Future. She is also chair of the Board of Trustees of the Kettering Foundation.

Thursday, April 17
7:00 pm
Nau Hall 101
University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA

Presented by VQR, the Pulitzer Center, and the UVA Office of the Vice President for Research.

For more information, contact Allison Wright, 434-243-4995, [email protected]