The collapse of the Rana Plaza garment factory in Bangladesh a decade ago, in which more than a thousand people died, led to a revolutionary French law on duty of care. How did it come about and is it effective in protecting workers' rights and the environment?
On 24 April, 2013, the Rana Plaza clothing factory in Dhaka, Bangladesh, collapsed killing 1,134 people and injuring another 2,000.
Numerous warnings over the building’s structural failures had been ignored.
The fact garment workers had been making clothes for companies sub-contracted by French and European brands caused outrage.
It led to the signing of the Bangladesh Accord, which defined safety norms in the country.
Here in France, a number of NGOs and left-leaning politicians argued that big French companies were also responsible for the sub-contractor’s compliance in human and social rights.
Despite opposition from right-wing politicians, business unions and the Ministry of Economy and Finance led by Emmanuel Macron at the time, a law on duty of care was finally voted in February 2017.
It stipulates that French-based companies with more than 5,000 employees in France or 10,000 with their foreign subsidiaries can be held accountable for violations of human rights and environmental damages throughout their supply chain.
The law requires such companies to produce vigilance plans and it provides a way for employees to claim compensation.
"It was a milestone, a crucial law," says Nayla Ajaltouni, coordinator of the NGO Ethique sur l'Etiquette – the French branch of the Clean Clothes Collective.
"It told transnational companies you cannot be totally free to do what you want."
Listen to a conversation with Nayla Ajaltouni in the Spotlight on France podcast.
Early days
Fifteen lawsuits have been filed against French companies so far. They include the Casino supermarket giant for deforestation in the Amazon, the Rocher Group cosmetics company for non-respect of union rights in Turkey, and the Danone food corporation for plastic pollution.
Around nine companies have received official public summons, mainly for cases of plastic pollution.
The first and most famous lawsuit was filed against TotalEnergies in 2019. French and Ugandan NGOs sued the energy giant for human rights abuses in an effort to force it to suspend its controversial Ugandan-Tanzanian oil pipeline, Eacop.
The case was thrown out by a Paris court in March on procedural grounds.
Ajaltouni recognises it was a disappointment, but says it was rejected by a "very specific" judge. "We still have other options, the case is not finished yet," she told RFI.
A 2019 report by a number of NGOs – including Action Aid, Amnesty International and Ethique sur l’Etiquette – found the law had had poor results and that the French government had taken little action to enforce compliance.
Ajaltouni says it's still too early to judge, not least because the law didn’t define which court should hear such cases and Total played on that to delay the start of the lawsuit.
Because the procedure is long, other cases have only just begun, she adds.
"The first step is to officially ask companies to publish their plan of vigilance, which can take time," Ajaltouni says.
"The second step is entering into the core question of violations and environmental damages, which also takes time."
European legislation
Most importantly, the French initiative has spurred action at the European level.
In 2022 the European Commission adopted a draft directive on duty of vigilance requiring some 10,000 companies to also avoid human rights and environmental violations in their supply chains.
"We always considered the French law as a first step towards a European law," Ajaltouni says.
"We needed to have a courageous country that dared to pass legislation on the subject. But what we want is for the European directive to go further than the French law because it has loopholes."
Ajaltouni points to the narrow definition of the supply chain, which excludes smaller factories, the inadequate system of liability, and the burden of proof that remains on the part of workers rather than companies.
"It’s very difficult for victims in these countries to have access to justice and to prove the responsibility of a company," she says.
It is hoped the directive will become law by the end of 2025.
"We are finally close to having a political consensus. But my main concern is of course the weight of the economic lobbies that don't want to see a transnational company be regulated," Ajaltouni adds.
"So we really need to fight those old forces to be able to move forward in society, to put labour and human rights before 'business as usual'."
