Call: International Day of Feminist Struggle – Menstrual products for all who need them!
Imagine you’re in pain, you’re bleeding, but you cannot leave work. You do not only risk consequences – you physically cannot leave the premises without the permission of your boss.
That is the reality for thousands of female workers at garment factories in South and South East Asia. Especially in Myanmar, the situation got even worse within the past four years, since the military forcibly took power, (re)installing a dictatorship. Even when the female workers are on their period they have to work overtime, six days a week and without proper sanitary facilities. In addition, the prices for menstrual pads have been rising so high, that most workers cannot afford them anymore. The toilets aren’t clean, there’s trash all over the place, the lights aren’t working properly and the workers use left over fabric from the garment factories as pads, often resulting in infections and allergies.
Not just in Myanmar – affected people all over the world have to pay for their own menstrual products and need to perform like anyone else on their jobs while suffering from pain and bleeding. Some are worse off than others as pain is always individual, and the various factors that lead to pain affect each person differently and vary from day to day.
In some countries, like South Korea, Taiwan and Zambia, some form of a right to menstrual leave was introduced already. Also, in Spain a similar regulation was just passed in 2023. Looking at these examples, there is no excuse for other countries not to follow suit!
We demand for menstruating people all over the world:
1. Free menstrual products at the workplace or the payment of a bonus equal to the cost of these products!
2. Paid leave for workers during their menstruation period!
3. Adjustment of workload for pregnant or menstruating workers and dropping of imposed production targets!
Our demands are directed at the factory owners as well as the clothing brands, which mainly profit from the exploitation inside the factories. They must ensure that the required conditions are met in the factories they source from!
The factory unions on the ground affiliated to FGWM confirm that production is currently taking place for the following brands:
- Sinsay (owned by LPP S.A. based in Gdansk, Poland. The company owns five distinct fashion brands: Reserved, House, Cropp, Mohito and Sinsay.)
- SHISKY (owned by DRIVE Ltd based in Nagoya, Japan)
- BREIZH OCEAN (based in Saint-Vigor-le-Grand, France)
- ONLY & VERO MODA (both belong to the company BESTSELLER based in Brande, Denmark)
- SOULCAL & CO (owned by the retail, sport and intellectual property group Frasers Group plc based in Shirebrook, UK)
- H & M (owned by H & M Hennes & Mauritz AB based in Stockholm, Sweden)
- ENCUENTRO (Encuentro Fashion Group based in Barcelona, Tenerife and Shanghai)
- ZARA & Bershka (both owned by the multinational fashion design, manufacturing, and retailing group Inditex based in Arteixo, Spain)
- SIOEN (Sioen Industries based in Ardooie, Belgium)
- FB SISTER (belongs to the retailer New Yorker – New Yorker Group Services International GmbH & Co.KG – based in Braunschweig, Germany)
- LA Vie En Rose (owned by Boutique La Vie en Rose Inc. based in Montreal, Canada)
- Hunkemöller (Hunkemöller International B.V. based in Hilversum, Netherlands and Worcestershire, UK)
- My Specials (belongs to Women’Secret based in Madrid, Spain)
- FieldCore (owned by Workman Co., Ltd. based in Shiba-cho, Japan)
- Etam (Etam Groupe based in Paris, France)
- LC Waikiki (ready-to-wear fashion company based in Istanbul, Turkey)
We are an alliance of workers organised in grassroot labour and factory unions, such as the Federation of General Workers Myanmar (FGWM), as well as the Free Workers’ Union (FAU) and the Industrial Workers of the World (IWW). The FGWM consists of seven (factory) unions, mostly in the garment sector. Due to the repression by the military dicatorship, the FGWM depends on international solidarity, to keep up their union activities.
We take March 8th 2025, the International Day of Feminist Struggle, as an opportunity to organise some specific support for factory workers in Mynamar. Everyone can join this effort and participate by contributing to this fundraising. Activists of the FGWM will distribute menstrual products to around 5000 people working at (garment) factories, which will support them for several months.
This fundraising is being organised by FGWM, members of grassroot unions of the Free Workers’ Union (FAU) as well as the working group Asia of the International Confederation of Labour (ICL).
Do consider to support our fundraising on gofundme.com! We aim to collect 15 000 Euros by May 11th 2025. In case you don’t like to use gofundme (also because of the high fees), you are welcome to support the efforts by transfering your contribution to the FAU Hamburg bank account. Every cent collected, will be used to support the factory workers.
Account name: AS FAU Hamburg
IBAN: DE43 4306 0967 2070 7898 00
BIC: GENODEM1GLS
Bank name: GLS Bank
Purpose: 8M FGWM solidarity
The fundraising is part of a broader effort to push for better sanitary facilities, free distribution of menstrual products inside the factories and the right for female workers to take days off work during their period. Factory owners and the involved brands are targetted to increase the pressure.
Want to spread the word in other languages? Check out the call in Deutsch and Español!
Feel free to contact us: info@fgwm-solidarity.org
Solidarity against Patriarchy!
#FGWMsolidarity