Third-party forces are pushing fashion to break through the moral dilemma.
Fashion Revolution Week, a global theme week event initiated by fashion industry NGO, Fashion Revolution, is closed today. This theme week includes not only forum speeches and shop visits distributed in various cities. This year, social networking has sparked a lot of hot topics. The tag #whomademyclothes (who made my clothes) got 256,000 discussions on the Instagram single platform.
In addition, the organization released the 2018 Fashion Transparency Index, which has received much attention each year. The report selects the world's 150 largest apparel brands and ranks them according to the social responsibility and environmental protection policies and results announced by the brand.
1. 2018 Fashion Transparency Index Report
The main conclusions of the latest report show:
1) Outstanding achievements have been made in 10 apparel brands. Adidas and Reebok topped the list with a score of 58 on a 100-percent basis. This is followed by Puma, H&M, Esprit, Banana Republic, Gap, Old Navy, C&A and Marks & Spencer in the 51 to 60 zone. ASOS is slightly below 50, but it is 18 points higher than last year. It is worth noting that the average score of 150 brands is only 21 points.
2) 98 brands involved in the 2017 evaluation, this year's transparency index increased by an average of 5 points, speculated that the Fashion Transparency Index report promoted brand disclosure information.
3) Major luxury fashion brands are also moving towards transparency. Hugo Boss, Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Gucci, Bottega Veneta, YSL and Burberry scored between 31-40 points, Hugo Boss scored 11 points, Calvin Klein and Tommy Hilfiger improved by 9 points, Gucci, Bottega Veneta and YSL increased by 8 points and Burberry increased by 7 points.
4) There are still many brands and retailers that lack transparency in information. This year, 8% of the report, 12 brands and retailers scored 0 points, and 2017 was 3% of the total number of brands. While some brands have disclosed more information than in 2017, those that do not disclose information have pulled down the overall average.
Dior, Heilan Home and s.Oliver still have not disclosed any information. Brands that barely disclose information include Barneys New York, Desigual, Jessica Simpson, Longchamp, Max Mara, Mexx, Nine West and Sandro. 32% of brands score less than 10 points.
5) More and more brands and retailers have announced a list of suppliers. 37% of brands and retailers have announced a list of Tier 1 manufacturers, which is 32% in 2017 and 12.5% ​​in 2016. The list of suppliers has also become more detailed, including information such as factories, street addresses, product types manufactured, and number of workers.
18% of brands and retailers disclosed their secondary processing plants, a figure of 14% last year. Only one brand, ASOS, disclosed where they sourced raw materials, and last year no brand disclosed this information.
6) More brands are only concerned with the disclosure of brand policies and commitments, not actual results. The brand has an average score of 46 points on the policy and commitment information release, and 21% of the brands score more than 80%. However, in terms of manufacturer traceability indicators, the brand average score is only 11 points. In terms of disclosure procedures and supplier evaluation results, the brand average score is only 17 points.
7) More and more brands value discrimination, but rarely disclose measures to promote gender equality. More than three-quarters of brands and retailers have issued discriminatory policies within the company and supply chain. But only about 40% of brands and retailers have issued equal pay policies for men and women.
8) Less than half of brands and retailers disclose the proportion of women in executive and executive positions within the company, and only 14% of brands and retailers publish annual gender wage gaps within the company. For the workers in the supply chain, about 80% of them are women, and only 13% of the brands have published detailed guidance on the problems encountered by female workers in the supply chain. Only 5% of the brands have disclosed in the supply chain. Gender-based labor violations.
9) The information disclosed by most brands is still difficult to obtain, hidden in external websites, and the language of the industry is nothing, and is often presented in different visual forms.
10) No brand or retailer scores more than 60 points. While brands and retailers are beginning to release more information about social responsibility and environmental protection, there is still a lot of important information hidden.
2. Why is the Fashion Transparency Index important?
After the collapse of the Rana Plaza factory in Bangladesh, which shocked the world in 2013, the secret behind the fashion industry was finally unveiled. The eight-storey building was originally a five-factory foundry, mainly engaged in the OEM business of major brands around the world. After 19 days of continuous search, the collapse eventually led to more than 1,100 deaths, which triggered close attention from the community on issues such as labor rights in the fashion apparel industry.
As a watershed event, the collapse of the Lana Plaza factory officially brought the fashion industry into the introspection stage.
For example, in the general effect of the butterfly effect, the criticism of the fashion industry has swarmed in between. These diseases are not only a single problem, but also a dysentery involving all links in the industrial chain. People began to realize that the fashion industry, which has always been known for its glamorousness, actually hides a large number of loopholes, not only the well-known environmental pollution, labor rights issues, but also secret supply chains, women's rights and other issues.
Then, a documentary called The True Cost (real cost) triggered a viral spread on the web. The documentary production director, Andrew Morgan, produced the documentary by launching crowdfunding funds on the Kickstarter platform at the end of 2013. He spent a year stalking garment factories around the world, recording everything from supply chain terminals to cotton farms in Texas to factory workers in Bangladesh.
This documentary plays an important role in improving consumer perception. People recognize that the fashion industry is highly harmful to the environment. For example, the world's second largest environmentally damaging environment is clothing. The garment and textile industry is the world's most polluted industry after the oil industry. Every stage of the garment life cycle poses a threat to the planet and resources. Producing a kilogram of cotton cloth requires more than 20,000 liters of water, which can only be made into a T-shirt and a pair of jeans.
However, on the structural issues such as the fashion supply chain, third-party organizations such as NGOs are playing a more catalytic role. Fashion Revolution is an NGO established after the collapse of Lana Plaza in Bangladesh to address the injustices of the fashion industry. It aims to continue to promote the unfair movement against the fashion industry throughout the year. In 2018, Fashion Revolution attracted 2.5 million people to participate in activities through social media, video, official website, etc. The fashion transparency index released by it has also received more and more attention in recent years.
Fashion Revolution uses a number of key words to define fashion transparency, including equal trade, labor well-being, labor wages, labor empowerment, gender equality, corporate responsibility, sustainable livelihoods and job opportunities, work environment, and environmental sustainability.
The Fashion Transparency Index is a quantitative measure of transparency. It is a quantitative and analytical tool for brand investors. It is also a driving force for brands to improve information transparency, and Fashion Revolution believes that the index can record the promotion effect of the campaign. .
The main reason for the fashion transparency as the core of the work is that after the collapse of the Lana Plaza, people had to dig the ruins to find the original contract. It took several weeks to investigate the fashion brands that had orders with these foundries, many of which were investigated. Fashion brands don't even know that their products are processed here.
Fragmentation and opacity in the supply chain make it more difficult to pursue accountability, and it is difficult to protect labor rights. The supply chain is also hierarchical, and a brand usually works with multiple foundries, including foundries that are responsible for cutting, stitching, and assembly, as well as suppliers who are responsible for fabric production.
Some brands evade the regulatory responsibility for front-end supply chain labor rights on the grounds of supply network complexity, but in fact, this still stems from the company's luck. Because once the supply chain becomes transparent, no company is willing to squeeze the supply chain labor rights, which is not good for corporate reputation, especially luxury fashion companies that have always paid attention to decent.
The transparency of the supply chain is constantly improving, not only can it promote the improvement of the company like a mirror, but also make the good practice more known and copied.
What is overlooked by many people is that the issue of supply chain labor rights is also closely linked to women's rights, which has become the focus of NGO work in this area. The reason is that the data shows that about 80% of the workers working in apparel foundries are women, and only 20% are men.
Women face a series of problems such as whether the factory provides protection for women's health and growth, whether they are equal pay for equal work, and whether women are exposed to violence in the workplace. Most of the female employees in a weak position can obtain a safe working environment, which largely represents the realization of the social responsibility of downstream enterprises.
3. Awareness awakening?
According to statistics, after the collapse of Lana Plaza, the female labor rights in Bangladesh have been rapidly improved by various efforts. The Fashion Transparency Index also continues to promote a sense of responsibility across the industry, and more and more fashion brands and retailers realize that sustainability and transparency will be the general trend.
Currently, 64 luxury fashion brands including Zara, Asos, H&M, Kaiyun Group, and adidas have pledged to further implement sustainable development measures by 2020. As a member of the Global Fashion Association GFA dedicated to sustainable development and recycling, each company has submitted specific goals for sustainable design, recycling of used clothes and the use of recycled textiles by 2020. GFA will release a progress in May. report.
Among them, Gucci, Saint Laurent and Balenciaga parent company Kaiyun Group have attracted attention in recent years for sustainable development, Gucci has abandoned the use of fur, and Stella McCartney has become a representative of the field.
Five years, in the development of open cloud has its own internal goals, some goals ahead of other luxury goods group, including the eradication of all product lines of PVC and other harmful chemicals, increase traceability, and procurement from European production system, Reduce environmental footprint, offset carbon dioxide emissions, and eliminate waste in the supply chain.
Driven by Marie-Claire Daveu, who was appointed Head of Sustainability and International Institutional Affairs at Kaiyun Group in 2012, Kaiyun Group has become a representative of the sustainable development of luxury goods groups. During the Shanghai Fashion Week last September, Kaiyun Group launched a small program and workshop for luxury innovation labs. Among the fashion companies that promise to promote sustainable development in 2020, the addition of fast fashion has also attracted special attention from the industry.
In the past few years, H&M Group has become the most active company in the fast fashion field to promote sustainable development through the recycling of used clothes. At the same time, with the launch of H&M Group's new brand of lifestyles such as Arket, the Group is pursuing a trend towards quality, thereby reducing the conflict between fast fashion and sustainability.
In March of last year, Japan Fast Retailing also announced the list of its leading manufacturers of fast fashion brands Uniqlo on the official website, including the names and addresses of 146 foundries at home and abroad. Previously, due to concerns about information disclosure to competitors and other reasons, the list of foundries has not been disclosed, but more and more European and American brands transparently announce their supply chain to consumers, and Fast Retail will also change its policy. Improve the transparency of the first line of production to gain the trust of consumers.
4. Be wary of green marketing
Although industry transparency is slowly improving, some analysts believe that it should be alert to the resulting green marketing and greenwash. In fact, in the report released by Fashion Revolution this year, the information disclosed by the company is largely biased towards corporate value promotion rather than practical results.
Earlier, after the Bangladesh garment factory incident, 100 brands including H&M signed a joint fire and construction safety agreement in Bangladesh and promised to repair 32 garment factories in Bangladesh. After the signing of the agreement, it was accused by the Bangladesh Workers’ Safety Alliance that it did not actively perform its duties, resulting in a slow maintenance process.
In addition, while actively promoting the recycling of old clothes, H&M was exposed to burnt 60 tons of unsalable clothing in Denmark since 2013, an average of 12 tons per year. In the face of allegations and doubts, H&M argued that it was a “defective†product that was not sold or recycled under any circumstances and was automatically destroyed.
After the incident, Else Skjold, a professor at the Torino School of Design in Denmark, reprimanded that in the eyes of the industry, H&M's approach is very hypocritical. Under the guise of “sustainable developmentâ€, there is actually nothing to do.
Some analysts pointed out that there are many fashion brands that launch a sustainable fashion collection, but people should pay more attention to the performance of other non-sustainable series of brands.
In addition to relying on industry supervision, the method of cracking down on green marketing speculators depends more on the awakening of consumer awareness. In November last year, a small note in the Zara clothes by Bravo Tekstil, a staff member of the closed garment factory, wrote, “The dress you want to buy is what I did, but I didn’t get it.â€
As more and more consumers become curious about "who made my clothes," the increase in industry transparency may be even faster. In the pursuit of speed, especially fast fashion should stop to think that excessive greed will destroy the future, consumers will wake up, withdraw from the infinite loop of constant consumption of mediocre items.
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