"H&M renews Global Framework Agreement"

The updated GFA builds on eight years of partnership and covers workers in around 1,000 factories supplying H&M Group.

The updated GFA features:

• Commitments to collaborate on due diligence aligned with OECD Guidelines,
• Strengthened language on preventing and providing remedy to gender-based violence and harassment,
• Acknowledgment of industry collaborations like ACT, the ACCORD, and Bangladesh’s RSC and Employment Injury Scheme.

Atle Hoie, IndustriALL’s general secretary added: “With this renewed agreement we continue the important work in the sector of further empowering workers and unions in H&M’s supply chain.

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H&M Group CEO Daniel Ervér added that well-functioning industrial relations, including collective bargaining, are key in promoting good working conditions and improved wages, viewing it as a step towards a more sustainable fashion industry.

The global framework agreement will continue to establish that

• The parties will jointly promote the signing of collective agreements both at factory, company and industrial level between relevant social partners,
• Workers have the right to refuse unsafe work as part of their health and safety rights,
• The parties will provide training for both management and union representatives on employers’ responsibilities, workers’ rights and obligations, industrial relations, collective bargaining agreements and peaceful conflict resolution,
• H&M will actively use all its possible leverage to ensure that its direct suppliers respect human and trade union rights in the workplace,
• Workers’ representatives are not discriminated against and have access to carry out their representative functions in the workplace.

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