I wanted to share highlights from my participation at the Textile Exchange Conference last October, which took place in London.
The conference is an annual event that brings together leaders and experts from across the fashion, textile, and apparel industry, providing a space to collaboratively explore challenges and solutions to overcome the climate crisis.
It was such a pleasure to moderate a session on ‘Talking targets’ – looking specifically at climate and nature. A powerful space was given to hear what is happening directly on the ground to cotton farmers like Nitaben Tadavi Vijaybhai, a CottonConnect farmer and climate change ambassador. Her stories were paired with actionable steps as well as scientific and technical expertise on target setting to help inform attendees of strategic direction.
The conversation was rich with insights and stories from Hardeep Desai – Global Head of Farm Programmes at CottonConnect, Franklin Holley – Director of Sustainable Fashion at Conservation International, Francesca Palamidessi – Senior Manager of Value Change Initiative Secretariat, SustainCERT and Dan Magrath – Corporate Responsibility Manager at Gold Standard.
Reflecting on the time together:
💭It is clear from our warmup exercise that whilst many organisations in the room had set climate targets, few had set nature-based targets.
💭Challenges at the grassroots level related to climate change are stark. Extreme weather is wreaking havoc on crops for farmers like Nitaben.
💭Many farmers in Nitaben’s community are facing economic repercussions because of this destruction – what they are asking for is support with training on the ground to help support their livelihoods.
💭Businesses must avoid carbon tunnel vision and recognise the interconnection of climate and nature, helped by frameworks from the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)
💭The launch of the Textile Exchange biodiversity dashboard can help organisations in the fashion, apparel and textile ecosystem measure, manage and act on nature as well as consider how they may become regenerative.
Thank you so much to Beth Jensen, Eleni Thrasyvoulou, Pe-Jae Brooks and the wider Textile Exchange team for having me.
You can learn more about Textile Exchange’s biodiversity dashboard here.
You may also be interested in the highlights from the 2023 Global Fashion Summit.
