Analysis of the fire risks and mitigation approaches in the apparel manufacturing industry: Implications toward operational safety and sustainability

Fire risks pose a substantial threat to the apparel manufacturing industry since they can lead to immense property damage, potential loss of life, disruption of business operations, and reputational damage. In an emerging economy like Bangladesh, fire-related hazards are crucial due to the numerous deadly industrial fire incidents in recent years. This research, thereby, proposes an integrated multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) framework to identify and mitigate fire risk hazards in the apparel manufacturing industry. Initially, the study identified 30 significant fire risk factors from the literature review. Then, after expert validation, an integrated Best Worst Method (BWM) and Weighted Sum Model (WSM) framework was utilized to prioritize the fire risk factors. Twenty-three mitigation actions were proposed afterward for the top-ranked risk factors based on National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) codes. An Interpretive Structural Modeling (ISM) with a Cross-Impact Matrix Multiplication Applied to Classification (MICMAC) analysis was later used to explore the interrelationships and dependencies among the mitigation actions. The ranking obtained from the BWM-WSM assessment revealed ‘combustible storage unseparated by fire-rated construction,’ ‘non-standard inspection, testing, and maintenance’, and ‘inadequate means of egress for the occupant load’ as the three most critical fire risk factors. The ISM-MICMAC analysis revealed ‘fire-rated construction’ and ‘standardized detection and protection’ as the most-driving mitigation actions. The study outcomes are expected to aid the managers and policymakers in emerging economies in formulating sustainable fire risk management strategies for the apparel industry and thus improve the operational safety and resilience of the sector.