Author: Editorial Team

  • Can the apparel industry help to reverse India’s declining female work participation rate?

    A commentary piece in the Economics Times by Arvind Panagariya, former Chief Economist at the Asian Development Bank and previous vice-chairman of the Government of India think-tank NITI Aayog, has highlighted the cost-efficiency of job creation in the apparel sector versus other industries. Comparing Shahi with Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) – a large conglomerate with operations in energy, petrochemicals, textiles, natural resources, retail, and telecommunications – he found that Shahi creates 252 times the number of jobs of RIL with a similar amount of assets. The findings lead to a conclusion that we have been committed to for many years: the apparel sector is a powerful opportunity to create high quality, formal employment, especially for India’s dwindling female workforce.

    To provide some context, India’s female labor force participation (FLFP) rate i.e. the share of women in the workforce has fallen from 35 percent to 25 percent since 2004. For 18-24 year olds, the fall has been even greater – from 35.8 percent in 1994 to 20.2 percent in 2012. This is against a global average of 40 percent, placing India 120th of 131 ranked countries in terms of female labor force participation.

    According to the World Bank, India could boost its growth by 1.5 percentage points to 9 percent per year if around 50 percent of women could join the workforce. Not only that, it would holistically impact women’s empowerment and access to resources, and could radically impact a range of systemic social issues including gender-based violence and lack of educational opportunities for girls.

    The apparel industry potentially provides a huge opportunity to turn the tide on India’s declining female labor force participation rate. However, the challenge of getting women into the workforce uncovers a complex, multi-faceted set of issues, from traditional gender roles, to a deeply unequal split of household work (India has one of the world’s largest gender gaps in unpaid work), to public safety.

    Good Business Lab, a not-for-profit social innovation lab incubated by Shahi, is exploring one aspect of this challenge. Through randomized controlled evaluations across 10 rural training centres in Karnataka which train women in apparel industry skills, it is seeking to understand the most effective way to identify, train and support women to gain employment and stay in work, as well as its impact on their overall welfare and empowerment both in the household and at the workplace.

    This is an important piece of work that Shahi is actively supporting. We truly believe in the potential of women to drive India’s workforce forward and hope to unlock powerful findings that we can implement internally and share with the rest of the industry and country.

    GBL has completed the baseline phase of the rural training center research project. For more information contact Lavanya Garg: garg@goodbusinesslab.org.

  • Gap Foundation’s 40th anniversary celebrations

    In September 2017, Shahi was invited to be a part of Gap Foundation’s 40th anniversary celebrations. Three of our leaders were asked to speak about their experience driving Gap Inc.’s soft-skills training program called Personal Advancement and Career Enhancement (P.A.C.E.) across Shahi’s factories.

    P.A.C.E. has been close to our heart from day one – Shahi’s inputs were taken at the time of program creation along with other credible partners. Mr. Jalandhar Giri, a Director at Shahi, has led the program at Shahi since its inception.

    Because of Shahi’s commitment to this cause, we became natural partners, and with the assistance of Washington-based International Center for Research on Women (ICRW) and Swasti Health Resource Center, a Bangalore-based NGO, a life-transforming program came into being after intense research and deliberations.

    P.A.C.E. training at a Shahi factory

    The garment industry employs a majority female workforce who often do not get to build a stock of soft skills needed to advance in their careers and better overcome personal challenges. P.A.C.E. has been designed to allow them unlock their potential through over 60 hours of training in various modules ranging from communication to financial literacy. Shahi was the first organization to run P.A.C.E. in its factories and has extended capsule versions of this program to key influencers in the participants’ lives, including their male co-workers, supervisors and family members. Since launching in 2007, this program has expanded beyond factories to include women and girls in community settings. Shahi has trained more than 35,000 women under P.A.C.E. and our goal is to train 48,000 women by 2024.

    With Doris Fisher, Co-founder of Gap Inc.
    Shahi team with Doris Fisher, Co-founder, Gap Inc.

    At the Gap Foundation’s 40th anniversary celebrations Chitra Ramdas spoke about P.A.C.E. and its impact on female garment workers. JD Giri and Anant Ahuja were also invited to speak with groups from Banana Republic and Athleta who were keen to know  more about Shahi’s experience. A particularly exciting moment at the event was meeting Doris Fisher (co-founder of Gap Inc.) who started Gap Foundation just eight years after opening the first Gap Inc. store, with the ambition of “doing more” than just selling clothes. Through her commitment to advance women in the supply chain, P.A.C.E. has been scaled all over the world.

    Later in the week, Chitra and Anant were panelists along with Kindley Walsh Lawlor (former VP, Gap Foundation) and Hollywood actor Ashley Judd at an event held during the United Nations General Assembly. Ashley Judd is known for her social activism, particularly on women’s rights. She also sits on the Leadership Council of ICRW. The celebration was a reminder of the importance of investing in the women that power the global fashion industry and reaffirmed our conviction to keep innovating and doing more for them.

    We’re happy and honored to have been part of Gap Foundation’s journey and hope to continue to advance women all over the world together.