It is always possible to buy something cheaper, but have you ever stopped to wonder why it’s cheaper, and what the real cost actually is?

Many of the clothes that you buy, from designer labels to souvenir T-shirts, from department stores to street markets, are produced by workers whose wages and conditions fail to meet minimum standards. Many of the abuses take place in poor third world countries, although they also happen in some of the world’s richest economies.

Vested interests will always claim that it is in everybody’s long term interests to drive costs down, but one only has to look at the profits reaped by multinational corporations, and the working conditions of third world workers, to see who really benefits.

Fair competition does not need an unlimited right of exploitation. It would be much better served by a system of minimum requirements for workers’ pay and conditions and environmental protection.

For more information on sweatshops and the global economy you can visit globalexchange.org.

For information on fair trade visit Oxfam’s fair trade page

For information and news on some of the regimes that enable exploitation of their own citizens visit Amnesty International