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Canopystyle Audit aims to expand sustainability portfolio of textile companies

"The fashion industry has increasingly relied on forests to create alternative fabrics such as viscose, modal, lyocell and other trademarked textiles. Healthy forest ecosystems are essential for mitigating climate change, as well as maintaining species diversity and freshwater systems. Progressing conservation solutions that benefit local communities, species, the world’s climate and intact forests are drivers behind the work of Canopy and the Rainforest Alliance with Aditya Birla."

 

 

Canopystyle Audit aims to expand sustainability portfolio of textile companies

 

The fashion industry has increasingly relied on forests to create alternative fabrics such as viscose, modal, lyocell and other trademarked textiles. Healthy forest ecosystems are essential for mitigating climate change, as well as maintaining species diversity and freshwater systems. Progressing conservation solutions that benefit local communities, species, the world’s climate and intact forests are drivers behind the work of Canopy and the Rainforest Alliance with Aditya Birla. The CanopyStyle Audit is a requirement for the 100 brands and retailers — including Zara, H&M, Stella McCartney and VF Corp — who make up CanopyStyle and a key performance indicator of Canopy’s overall assessment of viscose producers’ progress on their CanopyStyle commitments.

Canopystyle Audit

 

Audit findings contribute to CanopyStyle’s Hot Button Issue Report, which assesses viscose producers’ overall performance on forest conservation, advancements on developing fabrics made from recycled fabrics and alternative fibres, and sourcing transparency. To further improve sustainability of its operations, Birla Cellulose will continue to advance research and development on new technologies of recycled and alternative fibres, as well as ensure that its company-owned mills and wood suppliers continue to maintain their own independent third-party certification systems. The company also intends to build on its existing chain of custody systems and certified material sources.

Burberry initiative

Meanwhile the Burberry Foundation has awarded £3 million to the Royal College of Art in London to drive sustainable textile research. The grant will see the establishment of the Burberry Material Futures Research Group and expand the Burberry Design Scholarship Fund, a move that aligns with Burberry’s new five-year responsibility agenda. The Group will be the first explicit ‘steam’ research center at a traditional art and design university, applying radical thinking to invent more sustainable materials, transform consumer experience and advance manufacturing for the benefit of industry and the wider community. It will operate as a virtual hub and move to a physical space following the completion of RCA’s new building in Battersea in 2020.

Burberry’s CEO and chief creative Christopher Bailey, says the Group will cover a broad scope of work, including the development of sustainable materials and new manufacturing methods, as well as support British-trained design talent. The Group looks to take a long-term approach to promoting the ‘steam’ agenda, tackling educational inequality, reducing waste and supporting social and economic development. It will be led by the Burberry Chair of Material Futures, who will also be the academic lead of the Material Science Research Center and the first industry-named Chair post at the College. The £3 million grant also includes £750,000 to expand the existing Burberry Design Scholarship at the Royal College of Art (RCA).

The initiative is in line with Burberry’s new responsibility agenda, which will focus on three ambitious goals over the next five years: to support one million people in the communities that sustain Burberry’s business and the wider luxury industry; to ensure 100 per cent of Burberry’s products have at least one element that drives positive change; and to create new approaches on how to revalue waste from luxury good production in order to become carbon neutral in its own operations.

With such an audit in place, a significant result has come to fore that approximately 25 per cent of the global supply chain for viscose has now been audited and found to be low-risk in terms of containing fibres sourced from endangered or ancient forests, providing CanopyStyle partner brands with considerably more information on where their viscose and rayon fabrics come from.

 
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