Toxic Tanneries Poisoning Workers in Bangladesh

Bangladesh’s leather industry is worth a billion dollars a year, but that value comes at a significant human cost to the many workers employed in the country’s leather tanneries. The process of tanning leather hides is highly toxic. Workers face appalling conditions and are exposed to dangerous chemicals that also pollute surrounding waterways. VICE News correspondent Tania Rashid traveled to Dhaka, Bangladesh’s capital, and visited the tannery district in the city’s Hazaribagh neighborhood — ranked by international research organizations as one of the most polluted places on Earth — to investigate the conditions in which workers produce leather that is exported and sold all over the world. Watch “A Crime Unpunished: Bangladeshi Gang Rape“ -