Have any of you had the chance to grab a piece from the Ivy Park line? Well, it seems Beyonce’s latest fashion project is currently under fire for allegations that the collection is produced under “sweat-shop conditions”.
The fashion label, a joint project between Queen Bey and Arcadia owner Philip Green, produces its clothing in Sri Lankan factories that supposedly pay their workers merely £4.30 pounds, equating to a little over 6 dollars, per day (according to an investigation by The Sun).
The Sun explored the claims by interviewing several workers, who revealed some of the laborious working conditions of the factory. Some stories included 10 hour work days with only a 30-minute lunch break, and that MAS Holdings - the factory where they are based -pays them significantly less (almost 2/3 less) than the true living wage of the region.
“This is a form of sweat-shop slavery,” Jakub Sobik, of Anti-Slavery International, told The Sun. “There are a number of elements here that tick the boxes in terms of slavery, the low pay, restriction of women’s movement at night and locking them in. Companies like Topshop have a duty to find out if these things are happening, and it has long been shown that ethical inspections by these companies are failing. They should be replaced by independent inspections.“
