Bemberg™ by Asahi Kasei will be showcased at Filo fair, the international exhibition for orthogonal weaving yarns used in clothing and furnishings, circular knitwear and technical textiles, in a new special area, a dedicated open space reserved for sustainable fibers.

An exceptional fiber made from the smart-tech transformation of cotton linters pre-consumer materials, Bemberg™ is converted through a traceable and transparent closed loop process. The fiber will be showcased by three designers representing different and complementary part of contemporary consumer wardrobe. Zerobarracento, a gender-neutral emerging outerwear brand focusing on zero-waste product development, will present kimonos, padded jacket and wrap dresses made from Bemberg™ while Maurizio Miri will use Bemberg™ linings for its sophisticated tailor jackets.

A brand of sartorial clothing and artisan accessories, Waxewul will showcase a new product, the J_Hood Bag: a doubleface jacket with a comfortably removable hood that can be transformed into a finely hidden doubleface bag. An exclusive, innovative and sustainable garment with minimal impact on the environment made of BemBAZIN™ - a new generation of bazin created, patented and produced by Brunello which is composed by the high-tech and responsible fibers of Bemberg™ - on one side and of wax on the other, traceable and certified, guaranteeing a reduction in waste (two jackets in one) and a long-life cycle.

Euratex has released its vision for a new EU strategy for textiles and clothing. The new strategy aims to develop a forward looking business model and lay down the foundations for a competitive and sustainable European textiles industry.

The European Commission plans to publish an ‘EU Sustainable Textiles Strategy’ before 2021-end. It will also develop a ‘transition pathway’ for the textiles sector – being one of the 14 critical ecosystems of the EU’s new Industrial Strategy.

Euratex plans to develop a forward looking business model, lay the foundations for a competitive and sustainable European textiles industry. It strives for a recognition of the Textiles & Clothing (T&C) sector as an essential and strategic part of the European economy. The organization strongly believes in innovation, quality and sustainability as a source of competitiveness. It emphasizes the value of a skilled workforce, embracing new green and digital skills and supports open markets, based on free but fair competition.

Over the next few years, the resale fashion market is expected to grow 11 times faster than the regular fashion market. By 2025, the clothing resale sector is estimated to reach $47 million, says a new report by resale marketplace Threadup in its 2021 Resale Report. Yet, many luxury brands continue to stay away from market as they fear losing their exclusivity and market prices. As per Women’s Wear Dairy, brands also hesitate to adopt the required complex circular model due to the costs involved.

This year, luxury brand Kering supported a €178 million financing round for luxury resale platform Vestiaire Collective, However, LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the world’s largest luxury group stuck to offering new products. Bruno Pavlovsky, President-Fashion, Chanel SAS says, the company aims to retain control of distribution, and has no plans to partner secondhand marketplaces. .

Complete ownership of consignment

To engage in resale successfully, luxury brands need to fully own their consigning process, says Audrey Depraeter-Montacel, Managing Director-Retail, Fashion and Luxury, Accenture. However, some luxury brands tend to be slow in handling this process. They need to accelerate their involvement in everything from developing closer contact with the growing secondhand fashion audience, to being able to guarantee authentication, and layering first-hand storytelling into the process on the origins and design of a product.

The luxury sector can help brands achieve circular economy as it has higher average operating margin of 39 per cent compared to 22 per cent for the current linear model, says a joint report titled ‘The Future of Circular,’ by Accenture Strategy. Developed in collaboration with The Fashion for Good, the report adds, adoption of new circular business models will grow across the fashion industry in future and brands that fail to join will miss out on long-term benefits such as additional revenue streams, deeper customer relationships, and new customer touch points.

Resale ownership poses quality risks

However, it’s also important for brands to preserve their image, adds Pavlovsky. Dan Brewster, Senior Vice President-Marketing, Scalefast says, at times customers prefer to work directly with the brand. They feel secure while selling or buying products directly from the brand.

It can also be risky for luxury brands to own a resale platform as they may face issues like reverse logistics, certification of quality and authentication. Hence, brands continue to partner platforms like Vestiaire Collective and The RealReal. They can build their own resale platforms to enhance the delivery process. These can provide all required information on products besides making transactions and product authentication easier.

Such platforms can also enable sellers to charge a premium on the resale market, and offer a premium in-store credit instead of cash, adds Brewster. This model is likely to be profitable for top luxury names whose products are appreciated over time.

Partnerships with resale platforms boom

Luxury brands are also getting involved in the secondhand market with third party. Mulberry and Alexander McQueen have launched resale pilots this year in partnership with Vestiaire Collective. Partnerships help Vestiare increase customer engagement with the brands and tap into new audiences. The company currently has a global community of 11 million buyers and sellers and will continue to engage in partnerships in future.

A recent survey conducted in collaboration with BCG shows, customers are increasingly opting to shop with sustainable brands. Around 62 per cent respondents said they plan to buy clothes from brands partnering resale platforms. However, there’s long way to go before brands publicly participate in the resale movement, adds Depraeter-Montacel. First, they need to identify the most suitable resale model for themselves.

The fashion industry, a major polluter fails to achieve carbon neutrality despite repeated calls by environmentalists and experts. A new survey report by environmental nonprofit Stand.earth shows, around 75 per cent of 47 surveyed fashion and apparel companies do not use clean energy sources. They have been ranked under the F grade by the sustainability index. Some of these brands are industry giants like Under Armour, Prada, and Lululemon. Titled ‘Fossil-Free Fashion Scorecard’, the index ranks 35 companies ‘F’ grade for their efforts towards energy efficiency and transition to clean energy across their supply chains.

Growing dominance of fossil fuels

The report also ranks companies for their use of fossil fuel-based synthetic materials, such as polyester, as well as their public record on setting emissions reduction targets. It gives 20 companies an ’F’ score, 17 brands ‘D’ score, 9 labels a ‘C’ score and one company-Mammut a ‘B’ grade. The Stand.earth report highlights the use of fossil fuels by the fashion industry. It shows, the fashion industry continues to rely on coal for its manufacturing operations. This raises pollution levels in countries like Vietnam and Bangladesh, it adds. Of the 47 companies surveyed, only three brands -- Asics, Mammut and REI—have pledged to curb their green house gas emissions by 50 per cent by 2030. All other companies have set their emission targets at 30 per cent or lower.

Further, the report shows, brands continue to the ignore GHG emissions produced by their fossil fuel-reliant supply chain. Around 75 per cent brands in the survey have been graded with an ‘F’ for failing to use renewable energy resources across their supply chain.

Lack of renewable materials

Only six companies are using renewable energy in their supply chains. These include Asics, Levi’s, Mammut, Nike, Puma, and VF. Of these, only Asics has ended on-site coal burning across all Tier II supplier facilities. The remaining brands have committed to abandon coal use by 2030.

The report further highlights increasing use of fossil fuel-based materials by the industry. Many brands in the survey are seen to be using fossil fuel-derived fibers such as polyester. Only two brands, Vaude and Eileen Fisher, are using low-carbon materials. These brands have been ranked under the ‘B+’ and ‘B-’ grades. On the other hand, luxury labels and fast fashion brands like Chanel, Lululemon, Prada, M&S, Primark, LVMH, Gap and Ferragamo—have been ranked ‘F’ for being the worst performers on the sustainability front.

A similar report by Changing Markets Foundation names Boohoo for making most of its collections with synthetic materials. The report rebukes 60 per cent of all ‘green’ material claims by leading fashion brands as greenwashing.

The Stand.earth report also accuses brands of exploiting popular buzzwords like climate positive or carbon neutral, for financial gains. Most of these claims are not supported with any evidences of reduced emissions or altered sourcing or transportation methods. A case in point is Ralph Lauren, which though commits to achieve zero-carbon emissions by 2040, fails to improve its production processes with renewable energy.

Pakistans advisor to the Prime Minster on Commerce Abdul Razak Dawood informs, textile exporters will continue to benefit from Generalized System of Preferences (GSP) scheme for two more years and not believe rumors against it. This will help Pakistan’s footwear sector grow further, says Dawood. The country has launched the PSDH initiative to offer computer aided footwear designing courses with latest technology to develop the industry and individual entrepreneurs to consolidate their position in the global scenario.

Imran Malik, Chairman, Pakistan Footwear Manufacturers Association (PFMA) says, the industry offers adequate concessional regularity policies and tax relief, which helped it grow over the last three years. In the last three years, the association witnessed a 63 per cent increase in its membership, 92 per cent reduction in shoe import, 22 per cent increase in export.

Organized by the Hong Kong Trade Development Council (HKTDC) and sponsored by Create Hong Kong (CreateHK) of the Government of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region, Asia's premier fashion event Centrestageended on a successful note. The three-day extravaganza from September 10 -12, 2021, brought together more than 200 fashion brands from 24 countries and regions, with 30 fashion events taking place. It attracted over 2,550 trade buyers and more than 17,200 public visitors to participate and source fashion items. Over the three days of the event, close to 700 video business meetings were arranged to match global fashion buyers with exhibitors online.

The sixth edition of the fair was organized with the theme ‘Chapter Infinity’ to encourage fashion industry players to take creative approaches and reignite their design inspiration in the pandemic era, exploring the countless opportunities that lie ahead. ITOCHU Textile Prominent, the Hong Kong subsidiary of Japanese conglomerate ITOCHU, joined Centrestage for the first time. Celia Lo, Manager, said she identified two local designer brands for developing the company's women's casual wear business and will place orders averaging 1,000 pieces for each style.

Value fashion retailer and Primark-owner Associated British Foods has reported higher profit than a year ago and like-for-like sales in Q3 beating the comparable period two years ago, although Q4 reversed some of that gain due to new restrictions.

Total sales of the company in the second half of the 53 week-year to September 18 are expected to reach £3.4 billion and Q3 like-for-like performance is expected to increase by 3 per cent two-year-on-year.

Primark took a bigger hit to sales than many of its peers at the height of the pandemic as the firm doesn’t trade online. However, when stores reopened, it was also one of the most popular destinations for physical shoppers.

The brand’s sales improved as the period progressed and Q4 like-for-like sales are expected to be only’ 17 per cent lower than the same period two years ago.

The company quarter saw a continuation of the trend for 'comfort living' with “strong sales of leisurewear such as leggings and cycle shorts, and continued demand for seam-free matching separates for women during the quarter. It also saw a “good response” to the launch of new licensed product, such as the womenswear Disney paisley range. Sales of AW21 ranges “have started well” and its back-to-school ranges been strong.

Primark said its operating profit margin in H2, prior to the repayment of job retention scheme money, benefited from a "significant reduction” in store labour costs and lower store operating costs and is expected to be over 10%. Its forecast for full-year adjusted operating profit is now ahead of the profit delivered last year.

Looking ahead to its next financial year, the operating profit margin “will continue to benefit from lower store labor and operating costs”.

COVID-19 has led to a decline in Vietnam’s textile, leather and footwear production. The Vietnam Textile and Apparel Association informs the country has closed around 35 per cent textile and garment factories. Vietnam is the world's third largest textile and garment producing country behind China and Bangladesh. The leather and footwear industry, which has 15 per cent share in Vietnam market, is likely to suffer from the current disruption. Production at all 88 factories in the country has been suspended due to COVID-led disruptions. Adidas’ Taiwanese supplier Pouyuen, with factories in Vietnam, has suspended production.

The Delta variant of Covid that has hit the country has raised questions about the viability of the Vietnamese supply chain so much so that Apple and Google have delayed their shift to Vietnam. In the first eight months of this year, Vietnam earned $21.2 billion from garment and textile exports, and $12.6 billion from footwear exports with year-on-year rises of 9.7 per cent and 16.2 per cent, respectively, according to the General Statistics Office.

Trident plans to expand capacity across all divisions. The company plans expand its yarn business by adding 98,496 spindles and 3,600 rotors. It will expand sheeting business capacity to 70,000 mt per day, while energy business entails a capacity addition of 16.3 MW at its cogen plant. The textile player’s existing capacity stands at 589,248 spindles, 7,464 rotors and 160 air jet for its yarn segment, while its capacity in the sheeting segment is 120,000 mt per day and the cogen plant is 49.4 MW.

In August 2021, Trident produced 4,920 metric tons of bath linen in the Home Textiles Division while it produced 3.1 metric tons of bed linen and 11,103 metric tons of yarn in the same division during the same month. In Paper & Chemicals Division, Trident produced 14,721 metric tons of paper in August 2021 and 8,930 metric tons of chemicals in the same month.

Pakistan Textile Exporters Association (PTEA) has elected Sohail Pasha as its chairman for the third time. Rizwan Ihsan and Ameer Ahmed have been elected as senior vice chairman and vice chairman respectively. Earlier, the association elected 12 members to the executive committee for the next two-year term.

Hailing from a prominent and successful business family, Pasha is an active member of the business network Riaz Enterprises. He has a good reputation in exports, business and industry. With 27 years experience as a professional management executive, he serves on boards of many charitable, health and educational institutions contributing to society.

Muhammad Ahmed, Chairman, PTEA congratulated the new office-bearers and hoped they will strive hard to take this association to new heights in terms of advocacy, service and performance. He hoped the new PTEA team would make efforts to meet challenges and strive for an enabling environment to restore viability and growth of the textile industry.