FASHION REVOLUTION | FASHION TRANSPARENCY INDEX 2021
CASE STUDIES:
TRANSPARENCY IN ACTION Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC) & Open Apparel Registry ZDHC is an association of apparel and footwear brands, chemical suppliers and manufacturers working together to reduce the chemical footprint of global textile production by systematically transforming how chemicals are used and establishing tools for sustainable chemical management. ZDHC has partnered with Open Apparel Registry (OAR), a neutral and freely available tool that maps and assigns unique identification numbers to garment facilities around the world to help standardise facility names and addresses. Due to the global nature of supply chains and differing languages, various actors may record a facility’s name and address information differently, leading to duplicate, inaccurate and outdated information which makes verifying relationships between brands and their suppliers more complicated. A unique ID helps to change this - kind of like how there could be thousands of people with the name John Smith in the world, but a social security number or national
insurance number helps the government differentiate between them. Linking ZDHC and OAR’s databases has enabled communication between two previously siloed platforms, helping to reduce duplication and increasing the accuracy of the links between global brands and their suppliers. This is important because it helps stakeholders like environmental groups and government agencies to identify a facility, address chemical use and pollution and work together to improve wastewater treatment where it’s most needed. To date, ZDHC has contributed 2,638 facilities to OAR’s growing volume of 58,000+ facilities. As more organisations use the OAR platform and its unique facility ID, the accuracy of data related to a specific production site is enhanced because it means information from many sources about a single facility can be gathered and shared. In our research for this Index, we have noticed some brands have begun to share OAR IDs for the facilities on their publicly disclosed supplier lists, signalling just how helpful stakeholders find the unique IDs.
TRANSPARENCY CASE STUDIES
Advocating Rights in South Asia (Arisa) & the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO) Arisa is a Dutch organisation which advocates for strengthening the protection of human rights in South Asia in partnership with local groups. Arisa has carried out research into working conditions in Tamil Nadu for many years. Tamil Nadu is a state in the southern part of India where over 60% of all Indian spinning mills are located and where 280,000 workers are employed. The region accounts for 19% of the country’s overall textile output and approximately 30% of the production is exported to international brands and retailers, underlining the importance of this textile hub. There are thousands of adolescent girls and young women working within Tamil Nadu’s textile mills and many are at risk of exploitative practices that in some cases may amount to forced labour. These practices include excessive and involuntary overtime, extremely low wages, physical and sexual violence, restriction of movement and denial of freedom of association. Between 2019 and 2020, Arisa worked with SOMO, a not-for-profit organisation that investigates the impact of multinational
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corporations’ activities on people and the environment. The purpose of the research was to help enable structural improvements to employment, working and living conditions in Tamil Nadu’s textile industry, particularly for the most vulnerable worker groups; primarily child, adolescent, female and migrant workers as well as workers with tribal, ethnic or low-caste backgrounds, including Dalits. Arisa and SOMO used publicly available production location lists via Open Apparel Registry and the Panjiva database (a subscription-based database which includes detailed shipment information) to establish links between Tamil Nadu spinning mills and 10 multinational apparel brands. Research was carried out across 29 spinning mills and 725 workers were interviewed. Indicators of forced labour were identified across all 29 spinning mills, including: abuse of vulnerability, deception, intimidation and threats, abusive working and living conditions, and excessive overtime. Two of the implicated brands came forward and asked the research team to help them get in contact with other brands sourcing from a particular mill, which was possible to prove through publicly disclosed information. This led to three brands working together to address the allegations raised.
