The International Apparel Federation (IAF) and the International Textile Manufacturers Federation (ITMF) together unveiled Standards Convergence Initiative (SCI), an initiative to accelerate reduction of audit and standard fatigue. The forum was launched at the side session of OECD Forum on Due Diligence in the Garment and Footwear Sector held online from February 1 to 5. The SCI will be a wide platform to discuss and develop a strategy and tools to accelerate reduction of audit and standard fatigue in the global clothing and textile industries.

The auditing conduct of standard holders, along with brands, retailers and other buyers’ decisions determines if the industry is are moving in right direction of less unnecessary overlap of audits and standards. Therefore, one of SCI’s first steps, in collaboration with the International Trade Centre will be to create transparency in the conduct of the main standard holders, brands and retailers and 3rd party standard holders, measuring to what extent they are contributing to the reduction of audit and standard fatigue.

The SCI has identified four yardsticks to judge standard holders’ commitment to reduce audit and standard fatigue. These include: willingness to harmonize standards; compliance with OECD and ILO guidelines; use of existing platform to avoid audit duplication; global certification of auditors.

These criteria will provide a foundation for a structural monitoring of standard holders’ efforts to reduce audit and standard fatigue that will be carried out by ITC. During the session at the OECD Forum, the ITC explained how its unique Standards Map Database will be used to measure and monitor standard convergence in the industry. First results of the monitoring are expected in the third quarter of 2021.

Besides monitoring exercise, the SCI will foster collaboration between different stakeholders each working on a partial solution. And, because large brands and retailers sticking to their own standards block the reduction of standard fatigue, the SCI will continuously call on these brands and retailers to either drop their proprietary standards in favour of 3rd party standards or to collaborate in other ways that observably reduce audit and standard fatigue.