H&M has become the latest high-street clothing brand to promise to ‘detox’ its supply chain, following a Greenpeace campaign that has already prompted Nike, Puma and Adidas to commit to the phasing out of hazardous chemicals by 2020.
The clothing company announced the new commitment this week after a social media campaign by Greenpeace criticised its links to factories found to be discharging hazardous chemicals in China.
H&M’s pledge to eliminate discharges of all hazardous chemicals across its entire supply chain by 2020 follows similar promises by Nike, Puma and Adidas, which were also criticised by Greenpeace in two reports.
The company will also introduce greater transparency by publishing information about chemicals being released from its suppliers’ factories.
H&M does not own any factories, but instead buys goods from around 700 independent suppliers, primarily in Asia and Europe. The first round of information is due to be published by the end of 2012, and will include data on H&M’s key suppliers in China.
Greenpeace welcomed H&M’s commitment on its web site, commenting on the success of its social media campaign, which reached an estimated 635,000 people on Twitter and eight million who people have ‘Liked’ H&M’s Facebook page.
Campaigners also met H&M representatives last Friday to discuss how the new commitment will be delivered.
H&M said in a statement that it hoped to use its position as a leading brand to encourage other companies to make similar commitments.
However, a spokeswoman later downplayed the influence of Greenpeace’s campaign.
“In the press release that Greenpeace issued it sounds as if this is a result of their work/pressure on us. We would like to point out that this is not correct,” she told BusinessGreen.
“The meeting with Greenpeace that took place on Friday last week was planned some time ago, and Greenpeace’s ambition to eliminate the use of hazardous chemicals is also something we have worked with for a very long time.”
Greenpeace is now encouraging other companies to follow H&M’s example and make similar commitments.
“By committing to detox its supply chain, H&M is setting the trend for this season, and for every season to come,” said Greenpeace on its blog.
“Which clothing company will be next to detox? Who’s going to wait to be called out by fans for committing the latest fashion faux pas?”
