ABVTEX Audits Program: – ABVTEX is the Brazilian Textile Retail Association. The program emphasizes social and labor standards to promote sustainable supply chain management practices. The Brazilian group collaborates with Social Accountability Accreditation Services (SAAS) to provide international oversight and credibility to its audits.
B-Corp Certification – A Benefit Corporation Certification, or B-Corp Certification, is supposed to signify to consumers that the company is committed to environmental sustainability. Certification is contingent on self-reporting, and over 8,000 brands have, in theory, earned the designation. However, there are many aspects to achieving the B-Corp stamp of approval that have raised concerns about the value of the certification. These include, among others, self-reporting, transparency, inconsistent standards, cost and accessibility.
Biomimicry – Biomimicry is a practice that observes, learns from, and emulates nature’s strategies to solve human design challenges. It leverages patterns and strategies found in the natural world to create sustainable and innovative designs.
Additional Reading: Exploring Biomimicry in Fashion, by Sulagna Saha, fibre2fashion.com, June 2023.
Carbon Neutrality: Carbon neutrality aims to mitigate climate change by reducing the overall concentration of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere. The idea is to balance the amount of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions released into the atmosphere and the amount removed from it.
Fashion companies can achieve carbon neutrality by implementing different strategies to reduce, offset, or mitigate carbon emissions throughout their supply chain and operations. Some approaches include:
Additional Reading: “New Analysis Shows How Fashion Industry Can Lighten its Carbon Footprint,” UNFCCC.com, July 31, 2023.
Circular Economy: A circular economy is an economic system designed to minimize waste and maximize resources by keeping products, components, and materials in use for as long as possible through reuse, recycling, and regeneration. It is very different from our current system of “make-take-waste.” A common example is the fast fashion model, such as Shein, Zara, H&M, and Boohoo.
Additional reading “A New Textiles Economy: Redesigning Fashion’s Future,” by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation.
Fast Fashion: a business model based on rapid production and mass manufacturing of trending items to sell cheaply. How fast fashion is designed, made, and sold creates environmental and social issues due to excessive resource use, waste generation, and poor working conditions.
Additional Reading: What is fast fashion, and why is it so controversial? By Amaya McDonald and Taylor Nicioli, CNN.com, Published 11:28 AM EST, Fri November 24, 2023
Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is an international, independent organization that provides the world’s most widely used standards for sustainability reporting. It helps companies, governments, and other entities understand and communicate their impacts on climate change, human rights, and governance. GRI promotes transparency and accountability in sustainability practices.
Additional reading:
Greenwashing: A marketing or communication strategy where a company intentionally makes false or misleading sustainability claims about its products. This happens in every industry, not just in fashion.
Additional reading: Fashion Greenwash: How Companies are Hiding the True Environmental Costs of Fast Fashion, by Helle Abelvik-Lawson, Greenpeace.org.uk., April 24, 2023.
Higg Brand and Retail Module (BRM): The Higg BRM is a critical tool for companies aiming to improve their sustainability performance and align with industry global standards. The latest update to BRM was launched in March 2024. Cascale (formerly the Sustainable Apparel Coalition) announced the latest version in collaboration with Worldly (formerly Higg Inc.)
Additional Reading: Staff Writer. (2024, March 5). Cascale announces updated Higg Brand & Retail Module tool for ESG performance. texfash.com. Retrieved from https://texfash.com/update/cascale-announces-updated-higg-brand-retail-module-tool-for-esg-performance
Land degradation refers to the deterioration of the quality and productivity of land in terms of its ability to support various biological and ecological activities. This process occurs when natural or human-induced changes negatively impact the land’s soil, vegetation, water resources, and ecological balance.
Microplastics: Tiny plastic particles less than 5 millimeters in size, often resulting from the breakdown of larger plastic items. Microplastics significantly contribute to ocean pollution. A large portion of ocean microplastics are from synthetic textiles and the textile production process.
Organic Fabric: A fabric that has the designation as being organic, such as organic cotton or organic linen, is derived from plants grown without the use of synthetic pesticides, fertilizers, genetically modified organisms (GMOs), or harmful chemicals during the production process. Organic fabrics are usually biodegradable and often adhere to fair trade principles, ensuring that farmers and workers are paid fair wages and operate in safe and ethical working conditions.
Preferred Fiber or Material:
The definition we use comes from the Textile Exchange. “A fiber or raw material that delivers consistently reduced impacts and increased benefits for climate, nature, and people against the conventional equivalent, through a holistic approach to transforming production systems.”
Current criteria are mapped out on the Textile Exchange website as follows:
A preferred fiber or material is assessed according to the following pillars:
Additional Reading: Current Textile Exchange Definition: “Preferred fiber or material.”
Rayon: A semi-synthetic fiber made from wood pulp. The fiber has significant environmental drawbacks, including:
Additional Reading: Rayon (Viscose), CFDA.Com.
Responsible Wool Standard (RWS): The Responsible Wool Standard (RWS) is an international, voluntary certification ensuring animal welfare on sheep farms and traceability of wool from certified farms to final products. It recognizes best farming practices, promotes responsible sheep and land management, and sets industry benchmarks for improvement.
Science Based Target Initiative (SBTi) is a global body that enables businesses to set ambitious emissions reduction targets in line with the latest climate science, aiming to halve global emissions by 2030 and achieve net zero by 2050. It is a collaboration between CDP, the United Nations Global Compact, the World Resources Institute (WRI), and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), providing resources, guidance, and independent assessment to ensure companies’ targets are scientifically grounded and aligned with the goals of the Paris Agreement
Supply Chain (Fashion): The fashion supply chain encompasses the coordinated network of activities, entities, and resources involved in the conception, production, distribution, retailing, and end-of-life management of clothing and accessories. This process spans from sourcing raw materials to delivering finished products to consumers, integrating various stakeholders such as designers, manufacturers, suppliers, retailers, and consumers.
Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) is a non-profit organization that provides a framework for companies to report on industry-specific sustainability issues likely to affect financial performance. For example, Warby Parker, an eyewear company, reports under the “Apparel, Accessories and Footwear” industry standard. The index covers topics like the management of chemicals in products, labor conditions in the supply chain, and environmental impacts of manufacturing. Warby Parker can benchmark its sustainability efforts against industry peers using this standardized framework and communicate its progress effectively to investors.
Additional Reading:
KPMG. (2023, August 7). Five things you need to know about the SASB Standards. KPMG. https://kpmg.com/xx/en/home/insights/2023/08/ifrs-blog-sasb-standards.html
Textile-to-textile recycling: Refers to the process of breaking down a garment or piece of cloth into its constituent fibers and then creating a new textile or garment from those fibers. It helps to reduce the amount of virgin material used in manufacturing clothes.
UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) provide a blueprint of 17 interconnected global objectives designed to achieve a better and more sustainable future for all by 2030. They address a range of global challenges, including poverty, inequality, climate change, environmental degradation, peace, and justice. The SDGs address climate change primarily through Goal 13: Climate Action.
Additional Reading:
United Nations. (n.d.). THE 17 GOALS. Sustainable Development Goals. Retrieved June 24, 2024, from https://sdgs.un.org/goals
Upcycling: the process of repurposing waste materials into new products of higher value, quality, or utility.
