Bangladeshi women try on rare leadership roles for a fairer fashion future

Dhaka: Bangladeshi garment worker Nurunnahar Begum never imagined winning a leadership role at the Dhaka clothing factory where she first began as a seamstress in 2012.

But four years later, Begum, now 28, became supervisor of a team of 30 workers that checks the quality of clothes made by DBL Group, one of Bangladesh's largest garment suppliers to global fashion retailers like H&M and Walmart. More than half the country's sewing machine operators are women, but over 90% of their supervisors are men - a gender imbalance that hurts workers and productivity, researchers say.