Over the last year FEI has
facilitated student workshops in universities across the UK with
students from a variety of year groups and a range of different fashion courses
(design, buying, marketing, business and textiles). The impact of purchasing
practices – the way in which fashion companies do business with their suppliers
– on working conditions in the garment industry has been the focus of these
workshops. A role-play, the first in a series of educational
resources aimed specifically at fashion-related higher and further education
students, ‘Buying Power: how decision making in the fashion industry impacts on
working conditions,' encouraged
students to think about how a last minute design change on a dress or the
constant quest for lower prices by buyers impact on conditions for workers.

‘After this workshop I will make an effort to
help change the way the industry operates when I gain a job after graduating,’ said one International Fashion
Business student, at Nottingham Trent University.

Tutor training
has covered purchasing practices and the role of Multi Stake-Holder Initiatives
and gave participants the opportunity to hear from industry specialists. Tutors
have gone on to integrate the information from the training session into their
teaching. Tutor training sessions and the project steering group, which meets
three times a year to guide and evaluate the project, provides tutors with the
invaluable opportunity to network with tutors from other universities.

One of the
highlights of the year was the project conference 'Creating an Ethical Future
for the Fashion Industry,' which was held in March at the Fashion and Textile Museum,
London. The
event brought together representatives from Gap, Topman, Next, PeopleTree, the Ethical
Trading Initiative, Nicaraguan Women Workers’ Organisation (MEC) and trade unions
(ITGLWF) with fashion students and tutors to discuss where the fashion industry
goes from here to improve conditions for garment workers? Industry specialists
were given the opportunity to present different visions of what an ethical
industry could look like and participants then broke into workshops, covering a
variety of topics from slow fashion to multi- stakeholder initiatives, to discuss
how these visions might become a reality.

At the
conference, a public showing of award winning film about the garment industry ‘China
Blue’ and other events the project hosted speakers from labour rights
organisations and trade unions from Cambodia, Nicaragua and China. The power of
their personal stories, depth of knowledge and passion really engaged the
fashion students and tutors.

One of the most informative and inspiring
elements of the FEI project was a meeting with trade unionists from China.
It was really interesting to hear directly about their work. I had not realised how important the right of
[freedom of] association was to garment workers – it opened my eyes to the
limitations of codes of conduct as a tool for monitoring working
conditions. A Fashion
Tutor who attended the China Blue Film event.

The FEI
website is now up and running. Reports, factsheets, interviews, films and
images provide a wealth of information about the global garment industry. The
publication of a monthly e - bulletin keeps students and tutors informed of new
resources on the website, highlights up and coming events run by both FEI and
other organisations working in the field, circulates information about student
opportunities and keeps people up-to- date with developments in the industry.

Curriculum
development is taking place in a number of universities and universities are
bringing workers’ rights into their teaching through films, resources and
training accessed through FEI. FEI has helped London College of Fashion develop
an elective module on ethical fashion and project staff are involved in
teaching a new module on ethical consumerism at Central St Martins in the
coming academic year. The project has
been involved in the establishment of a Masters in Ethical Fashion at the
University of the Creative Arts (Epsom) and a Masters in Fashion and the
Environment at London College of Fashion.

The project
was initially funded by the Department for International Development (DFID)
from the Development Awareness Fund for three years and has recently secured a
major grant from the European Commission that will allow it to run for a
further 2 years until 2010. Over the coming year workshops are planned in
universities across the country. The project will focus on developing links with
universities in the North, Scotland
and South of England. After the success of our last conference we will be
holding a large event in Manchester
in the spring of 2008. This year will also see the launch of the FEI student
and tutors manuals.