In a statement released by Mr Stan Raggio, Senior Vice-President of International Sourcing at GAP says, “We will continue to source from India. We work closely with many stakeholders and receive valuable and important help from the local NGO community that assists our ongoing effort to ensure that our products are manufactured in a socially-responsible way. Our efforts in this important area will continue.”
This clarification was released due to the statement made by the Minister of State for labour, Mr Rawat, that GAP, which is an international retailer of apparels, had stopped outsourcing manufacturing of garments to Indian companies, on the pretext that garment manufacturers in India were using child labour.
Mr Rakesh Vaid, Chairman of the 6,300 member strong Apparel Export Promotion Council termed the statement by the Minister as factually incorrect and said that these kinds of statements will do more harm to a sector which is already under stress and has seen exports of apparels falling since the last few months.