CSR: ZARA Announces Commitment To Sustainability
The fashion industry is becoming polarized. With more and more consumers seeking sustainability and transparency in fashion, it is becoming very challenging for fashion brands to supply products that are sustainably produced, are fashionable and are also at an affordable price.
Responding to the changing trends and several fast-fashion brands such as H&M have committed to being more climate positive. In an effort to meet the challenge and be at par with the competition, Inditex, the parent company of Zara, announced that the apparel manufacturer and retailer would ramp up its sustainability efforts. The chairman and CEO of Inditex, Pablo Isla, announced to a packed room of shareholders that 100 per cent of the cotton, linen and polyester used by all eight of its brands will be organic, sustainable or recycled by 2025.
Zara, the most popular and visible of the company’s brands in many countries worldwide, plans to stop using synthetic fibres derived from fossil fuels in its clothing, accessories, and shoes globally.
Apart from this, by 2020, Inditex has committed to fully eliminate the use of plastic bags, a milestone already attained at Zara, Zara Home, Massimo Dutti and Uterqüe. And by 2023, it aims to eliminate all single-use plastics totally from its customer sales.
The sustainable fashion movement is growing, and given consumer trends, will keep growing more and will stay. Zara’s competitors and other fast fashion giants, such as H&M, continue to come out with similar commitments. However, when smaller and newer fashion companies such as Everlane and Reformation that have been built from the ground up with sustainability in mind will come forward, the bigger brands will face major challenges. These challenges will eventually help in improving the transparency of their supply chains and encourage them to bring more sustainability in their operations. Which is required through and through in order to make the world a better place to live in.
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Regards,
The CSR Journal Team
