by Malayna
If you've ever paid attention to the tags on your clothing, you might have found yourself cringing as you envision sweatshop conditions in places you've never been. In Sri Lanka though, the apparel industry has gotten together to let us all know that we can buy their Garments Without Guilt. That's what they've named their mission-turned-movement, and you join them at www.garmentswithoutguilt.com.

The garment business in Sri Lanka changed a few years ago with the lifting of quotas, giving individual manufacturers reason to look at what they could do make their business stand out. Sri Lanka's Joint Apparel Association Forum (JAAF), an association of garment manufacturers on the teardrop-shaped island in the Indian Ocean, realized that they were already meeting and often exceeding international standards in terms of human rights, women's rights, labor rights, and corporate social responsibility.

"Children have no business in our business" is one of their slogans, and they not only refrain from hiring children, they invest in education as well, for children and for adults, allowing them to improve their circumstances and their lives. Sri Lanka Apparel's community programs run the gamut from providing drinking water to rural towns to hiring and empowering the differently-abled. They also have eco-friendly factories in operation and others being built.

The organization had an international certification company verify standards at individual garment factories, and now they can claim with confidence and conviction (as they do on their website) that their "ethical sourcing and sustainable development practices aim to empower women and support their communities--through poverty alleviation and offering opportunities for education and personal growth. With the development of sustainable eco-friendly solutions to apparel manufacturing, we have endeavored to make the 'Made in Sri Lanka' label synonymous with quality, reliability and social and environmental accountability."

With their new website design launch at the Colombo Fashion Week on Jan 27th, they've taken the first steps toward expanding the idea to make it into a movement with a global mission. Join them. It's green, it supports the empowerment of women, it helps children and funds education, and it promotes fair trade and human rights. So look out for "Made In Sri Lanka" when you're looking to buy clothes, and encourage other countries to enforce similar standards with the power of the green-for-a-reason dollar in your wallet.