’re way beyond that question now.” This can be seen in Australian department store chain Myer’s recent decision to publish its factory list for its private label brands, including Miss Shop, Basque and Piper, and commitment to ensure that the women who make its clothes are paid a living wage. “We know how important ethical sourcing is to Myer customers and team members and that is why we continue to deliver against, progress and improve our established sourcing program,” a Myer spokesperson told Inside Retail. “This includes outlining our ongoing work in this area with our commitment to a living wage and factory information, ensuring an even more transparent supply chain.” While Myer has not provided a timeline or specific plan to achieve this commitment, Emran believes the move could still have an outsize impact on the industry, given the retailer’s scale and standing in the country.  “When a big brand like Myer shows the pathway for other brands to follow, it does send a very strong signal across the industry that there is momentum and they need to join it,” he said.  Moving in the right direction  A living wage is defined as the amount a worker needs to support a decent standard of living for them and their family, including food, water, housing, education, health care, transportation, clothing, and other essential needs, as well as savings for unexpected events.  “Technically speaking, the living wage should be equal to a minimum wage, but in reality that’s not happening,” Emran said. “What is happening is that the minimum wage in these countries is so low that workers are living in poverty. The reason is that factories want to be competitive, and they’re keeping wages low to offer products at a low price to brands.” Out of the 25 brands that Oxfam Australia is tracking for What She Makes, 20 brands have now published their factory lists and made commitments to pay a living wage, including David Jones, Country Road, Cotton On, Target, Kmart, Big W and Best & Less.  Modibodi and Zara are in the process of doing so. Just Group’s Just Jeans, Jay Jays and Peter Alexander brands, are the only brands that Oxfam Australia is tracking that have not taken these steps.  But while most brands are moving in the right direction, Emran said they need to do more to convert their commitments into action.  “At this point in time, we still can’t say that workers are being paid a living wage,” he said. “It’s a good start, but we really need to follow up to see if these commitments have been realised.”  If brands stick to their timelines, he believes they could reach the goal of paying garment workers a living wage in the next three to five years, depending on the size of the brand. Ringfencing wages Most of the brands that Oxfam Australia is tracking are in the process of ringfencing wages. This involves separating labour costs from the overall purchase price to ensure they’re not impacted by negotiations with suppliers.  Oxfam Australia estimates that just 4 per cent of the price of a piece of clothing sold in Australia goes toward workers’ wages in garment factories. It has found that it would cost brands less than 1 per cent of the price of a garment to absorb the cost of paying living wages within their supply chains. However, Oxfam Australia only recognises three brands as having implemented ringfencing so far: H&M, Gorman and Dangerfield. Just Jeans, Jay Jays, Peter Alexander, Lorna Jane and Jeanswest have not made any public commitment to ringfence wages, according to the not-for-profit. The other 17 brands are somewhere in the middle.  After ringfencing, the next step is to perform a wage-gap analysis to identify the difference between the wage that brands are paying now and a living wage, and the percentage of garment workers in the supply chain who currently earn less than a living wage.  This information is crucial to make a plan to reduce the gap and start making progress towards the goal of paying all workers a living wage.  “If you see that 20 per cent of your workforce are below the living wage, you can make a target to reduce that to 15 per cent next year, and then to 10 per cent and then to 5 per cent,” said Emran. “But until you do this, you don’t know what your baseline is.” One brand at a time  While the problem of extremely low wages in the garment industry might seem insurmountable, Emran believes it can be solved one brand at a time. That’s how the garment industry has largely eradicated child labour, he said.  “Twenty years ago, child labour was a huge issue, and now, you can hardly find it, because once the issue was identified, more and more brands started joining the journey to make sure that there was no child labour in their supply chain,” he said. The same thing happened with supply chain transparency after the Rana Plaza building collapse, he said. Now, it’s considered standard practice for fashion brands to publish their factory lists.  As more brands join the journey, Emran believes it will send a signal to garment-producing countries that they can raise wages without brands moving production elsewhere.  “The classic example is Vietnam. They’ve increased wages quite consistently over the last five or six years, but the volume of their business has not gone down,” he said.  Oxfam Australia is expected to release its ‘naughty or nice’ list, an annual report of brands’ progress towards paying garment workers a living wage, in November.