The MFA Forum is an open network of over 70 participants representing brands and retailers, trade unions, NGOs and multi-lateral institutions, with the participating organisations listed below.
The aim of the MFA Forum is to promote social responsibility and competitiveness in national garment industries that are vulnerable in the new post-MFA trading environment.
The MFA Forum has agreed a set of overarching principles to guide actions of individual actors and collaborative initiatives, which are laid out in The Collaborative Framework (MFA Forum March 2005). These principles are implemented through engagement at a country level, ensuring that efforts are or lead to ‘home owned’ and ‘home grown’ actions to sustain the national industry. This means that MFA Forum participants try to meet with all stakeholders of national industries, including the government, and aim to bring these different groups together into discussions around the future of their industry.
Participants of the MFA Forum are free to initiate meetings in any country that is vulnerable in the post-MFA trading environment, in order to set up a collaborative approach to outlining strategies for that industry.
In May 2005, the MFA Forum decided to set up in-country groups to work initially in Bangladesh and in Lesotho, as there was clear evidence that each country was facing difficulties maintaining a sustainable industry in the post-MFA era, and many MFA Forum participants faced direct challenges there.