Giants in the footwear and clothing industries have teamed up to form the Sustainable Apparel Coalition: a group whose goal is to create and adopt a system that will measure the social and environmental sustainability of products, thus respecting nature as well as workers.
The list of brands, retailers and manufacturers speaks for itself: Adidas, Esprit, Gap Inc., H&M, HanesBrands, JC Penney, Lenzing, Levi Strauss & Co., Li & Fung, Marks & Spencer, New Balance, Nike, Nordstrom, Otto Group, Patagonia, Target, Timberland, Verité, VF Corp, Walmart, C&A and others are some of the names. The group has the support of the United States–based nonprofit organisation Environmental Defense Fund.
Based on previous work made by the Outdoor Industry Association, this ‘Eco Index’ tool is still a work in progress, but brands and retailers concerned should start testing new ways of measuring sustainability from as early as next month. Eventually, the plan for the future is to gather all the information, develop a scoring system and turn it into a label which customers will be able to consult when shopping for products.
By Matthieu Guinebault
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