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I agreed to what the extract says in the critique of garment industry in Sri Lanaka. If we look in to thecurrent context of Sri Lankan garment industry, we can notice that female workers predominated in thegarment industry by 87 % while the male workers contribution is 13 %. The garment industry in SriLanka is women-oriented industry. However, the management grade is dominated by male workers andoperative grade is led by female workers. Most of female workers are employed as operators in thegarment field. The share of females in occupations of machine operators and others is over 90 percent.

There is equal participation of both sexes in pattern making, quality controlling, merchandising,designing and quality assurance. This table 2 depicts how the workforce of garment industry iscomposed by 1998. Even when we consider the present situation, we cannot expect the importantchange of the proportions of male and female contribution to the work force of garment industry.Nonetheless, none paid thorough attention to the feminine gender worked for garment factories leavingfemale workers are cheap and submissive labour suppliers.

I just wanted show to which degree the female work force may become the most pivotal factor for the

productivity and competitiveness in the international market. Higher turnover and higher absenteeism

of the female workers than the average affect the productivity of garment industry and this will

restraint factors to the enhance productivity of garment industry.

Table 2

Table 1

Labour force participations

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The competitiveness in international market, productivity and factors affecting the productivity are

inextricably linked. In the discussion paper on Productivity, Competitiveness and Job Quality in

Garment Industry in Sri Lanka by Saman Kelegama and Roshen Epaarachchi they introduce

dependence of competitiveness on productivity and job quality in following diagram.

Especially these garment factories are clustered to particular industrial areas. These are termed as EPZ

(export processing zone) or FTZ (free trade zones). Therefore, these areas are congested and the

environment of these areas is not conducive for especially for female workers. Many female workers

tend to find their accommodation within the vicinity of their factory. Therefore, available

accommodations for the female workers are generally of poor condition due to increasing congestion

around the urban garment factories and Free Trade Zone areas.

The lodging facilities are commonly small rooms with limited additional facilities and inadequate

sanitation. The security for female workers is at lower level and hence, female workers are vulnerable

even in their accommodation. Furthermore, the rent can constitute a significant proportion of the

workers salaries. Even though the government took measures to address, the issue by building up

hostels it was far from the requirement and the problem remained almost as usual. Following chart was

adopted from Productivity, Competitiveness and Job Quality in Garment Industry in Sri Lanka A

discussion paper Prepared by Saman Kelegama and Roshen Epaarachchi for Institute of Policy Studies

of Sri Lanka. It reflects to which extent workers are provided with transportation and hostel facilities in

the industry

Chart 1

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The poor working condition in the factory can be caused by the various reasons such as hazardousfactory layout with cramped workspace, lack basic facilities such as canteens, toilets, etc., and in many

cases, regular breaks for using these Facilities are not provided. In particular, sexual harassment is the

vital stress-generating factor for female workers.

In the ILO-SAAT panel discussion, Sri Lankan government representative admitted that the wages for

both male and female are the same, but the female workers endure other forms of difficulty, e.g.,

harassments, hardship in travel to and from work, dual responsibility of family and work, etc.

Even though there are numerous labour regulations female workers have to work for long hours toachieve the production targets. They have to work for night shift without appropriate facilities.

Even if some factories provide transport, most do not. Moreover, some of the surrounding roads are not

adequately lit at night and female workers in some cases encounter harassment and other unsafe

situations. When workers are coming to work by using of unpunctual public transportation services it

may cause a stress to some extent.

When the stress exceeds the bearable level and it is not controlled it will become psychological stress.

The productivity of female workers may diminish due to higher turnover and absenteeism, which are

caused by the psychological stress.

Since female employment in the garment industry is largely concentrated in low-skilled and unskilled

jobs, most female workers unfortunately would not benefit to the same extent from the rising trend in

wage rates. It is even possible that less skilled female employees would be replaced by skilled maleemployees, thus widening the gender discrepancy in division of labour. Women workers, therefore, need

to be specifically targeted for human skills development.

Other factors, which contribute to such situation, are poor interpersonal relationships at the work place,

autocratic management style, lack of variety in work, low use of skills, poor pay, and low value given to

work in the society, especially for the female garment labour. We should consider to which extent the

authorities have addressed the above issues and the remedy for those to upkeep the especially female

workers life in garment industry.

Table 3

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.

The study of Productivity, Competitiveness and Job Quality in Garment Industry in Sri Lanka by

Saman Kelegama and Roshen Epaarachchi reveals where our female workers are and how to cope with

those issues in the garment context. Overall, female garment workers are almost ill-treated in

comparison to the male workers. Female workers are in Sri Lankan garment field vulnerable and

sensitive to those factors the productivity. Most of rural women come to find employments in garmentfield with pressure of the rising expenditures and future expectations but with unfavourable situation

may cause absenteeism and higher turnover of those workers. Here table 4 shows garment absenteeism

and turnover of both female and male workers.

According to findings of study, these factors negatively affect the productivity of the industry because

those factors and productivity has the relationship as depicted in the Chart 1.

To alleviate poor working condition and promote enhanced working conditions are inseparably linkedto improved productivity and the failure to admit this has contributed to low productivity in

increasingly competitive international environment

Table 4