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Nordics live is in the forefront of sustainability and now ‘Velour by Nostalgi’ has the label to prove it. The Swedish menswear brand received a Nordic Ecolabel license for its Svanen jeans. This means that the particular jeans meets 99 per cent of the demands of Nordic Ecolabel.
Launched in 1989, the Nordic Swan Ecolabel serves as the official Nordic Ecolabel given out by the Swedish government through a non-profit and state-owned organization called Ecolabelling Sweden. The label strives to help consumers shop with the environment in mind and bolster sustainability.
Benefits of the denim include no dangerous chemicals, toxins, endocrine disruptors, or heavy metals, better working environments for factory workers, less production pollution, and better fabric. Velour by Nostalgi debuted in producing sustainable denim in August 2016. Per Andersson, Founder of Velour by Nostalgi said his company wants to offer and help end consumers make better and more sustainable choices. The Svanen Ecolabled jeans come in five washes and two silhouettes, a loose 90s fit and a regular fit. They will be available online starting from February 13.
In its newly published report, Transparency Market Research has studied the global socks market in detail. The report titled ‘Socks Market - Global Industry Analysis, Size, Share, Growth, Trends and Forecast 2015 - 2023,’ states the socks market is expected to progress from $5.6 bn in 2014 to $11.6 bn by 2023.
The global socks market is expected to exhibit an 8.50 per cent CAGR from 2015 and 2021. Considerable growth in the retail sector, constantly growing men’s apparel industry and improving fashion trends are responsible for the growth of global socks market.
Socks, one of the common consumer goods, are available in global market in many materials and varieties. In recent years, due to the introduction of luxury socks, they have been considered more as fashion products than common consumer goods. Even though socks account for a smaller share in the global apparel market, their demand is expected to increase considerably in the years to come.
The rising boom in global socks market has allowed new companies to introduce their products. Increasing per capita income in various countries has enabled the global socks market to become the fastest growing market in the global apparel market.
The Transparency Market Research report divides the global socks market on the basis of region, gender, product, and material used. On the basis of product, the global socks market is classified into specialty socks, athletic socks, trouser socks, casual socks, women’s socks, and others. The demand for athletic socks is expected to be the highest in the global market due to the increasing demand for athletic shoes. Going forward, the increasing pool of consumers participating in sports is expected to boost the athletic socks segment.
Last December, PVH Corp along with its Tommy Hilfiger brand signed with the UN Global Compact, a massive initiative aimed at harnessing business’s role in global sustainability. The UN Global Compact is a platform for the development, implementation and disclosure of responsible corporate practices.
The initiative has enlisted more than 9,000 corporate members 3,000 non-business signatories based in 160 countries around the world to lead change on the global sustainable development agenda by aligning their operations and strategies with 10 universally accepted principles in the areas of human rights, labour, environment and anti-corruption.
Last year, PVH marked the 25th anniversary of its code of conduct for business partners. Titled ‘A Shared Responsibility’ the code of conduct helped the outfit pioneer new practices in social compliance when it first launched in 1991.
The company recently launched an enhanced global corporate responsibility strategy focused on empowering people, preserving the environment and supporting communities. PVH’s strategies supports many of UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals such as building safety, chemical management, greenhouse gases, inclusion and diversity, and supporting the needs of women and children. PVH and Tommy Hilfiger are also working with the UN’s CEO Water Mandate, which is committed to safeguard and preserve water resources.
Founded in 1881, Phillips-Van Heusen Corp.(PVH), owns brands like Tommy Hilfiger, Calvin Klein, Van Heusen, Izod, Arrow, Warner’s and Olga. The company also holds the license for Speedo brand.
Making a fresh start in the beginning of the new year, Oeko-Tex has reviewed the requirements of its products and published its new regulations. A large number of new changes will be made to Made In Green, MySTeP, STeP, and Standard 100. Oeko-Tex are independent textile testing institutes working for enhanced product safety and sustainable production in the textile value chain.
The Oeko-Tex Association has established a new price strategy for the Made in Green by Oeko-Tex product label to fully satisfy market requirements. The new pricing offers label issuers the option to use smaller packets of labels, or even a single label for their product to be labelled with Made In Green by Oeko-Tex.
After having been for three years in the market, Oeko-Tex has revised the STeP by Oeko-Tex limit value tables in Annex G1 and G2 of the standard document. These revisions were influenced by ongoing changes in the global environment, input from customers and current regulatory developments. A new chapter has been added in Annex D: “Hazardous Processes That Should Be Avoided”. These processes that are to be avoided include the use of potentially hazardous surfactants, sodium hypochlorite (as a bleaching agent) and defoamers that are potentially damaging to the environment.
The new regulations for Standard 100 by Oeko-Tex will come into force on April 1 following a three-month transition period. At the parameter ‘per- and polyfluorinated compounds’, a large number of substances have been added or listed explicitly by name in product class I (items for babies and small children) and provided with limit values. As a result, in product class I, the use of per- and poly fluorinated compounds is severely restricted and nearly eliminated. A large number of substances are also included in the list of regulated softeners (phthalates) in all of the product classes. The three organic tin compounds dipropyltin (DPT), monophenyltin (MPhT) and tetraethyltin (TeET) are now regulated with limit values in all product classes. In addition, the use of the blue colourant Navy Blue is also now explicitly prohibited for product certification according to Standard 100 by Oeko-Tex.
Odisha launched the Odisha Apparel Policy recently. Reacting to it, deputy general manager of Odisha Spinning Mills Federation Narayana Sahu said this is the first exclusive policy for apparels by any state and is a positive gesture for industrialists from Tirupur and other clusters to choose Odisha as destination for setting up manufacturing facilities.
Welcoming entrepreneurs to his state, he said that those who wished to make investments in Odisha would be extended a slew of incentives both for setting up standalone apparel production units and opening up units inside apparel parks coming up in Odisha. Incidentally, the government of Odisha is planning to make two apparel parks under the Apparel Policy near Bhubaneswar.
Sahu stated every individual standalone unit would be given an incentive of Rs 1,500 per worker every month for a period of 36 months provided they employ a minimum of 200 workers. Besides this, interest subsidies could also be availed by such units. For the units coming up in the apparel parks, capital grants to the tune of 20 per cent of the project cost would be given, he declared.
The Air Freight rebate scheme for textile and apparel known as the 'Speed-to-Market' Scheme (STMS) as announced in Budget 2016-17 will be launched this month after consultations with the various stakeholders. STMS aims at developing the 'Speed-to-Market' textile and apparel export segment in the wake of Brexit. It will also allow Mauritian textile and apparel exporters to become more competitive vis-à-vis other countries exporting via air freight to Europe.
Another objective will be to enhance the competitiveness of Mauritian exports in the European market especially in terms of speed of delivery while at the same provide support to the textile and apparel enterprises facing difficulties in the wake of Brexit.
The STMS which will be applicable to the textile and apparel manufacturing companies only, will among others; provide a 40 per cent refund on air freight cost to exporters to Europe including UK; be time-bound for 2 years; and will be operated and managed by Enterprise Mauritius. The refund will be applicable for exports as from April 1, 2017.
Owing to declining production of cotton this season, Pakistan will have to import 4 million cotton bales at a cost of $1.50 billion, says an estimate. This situation could worsen the economic situation as loans already given and now imports of such significant amount can create problems for the country’s economy.
Here, it is relevant to mention that the economic growth was affected by 5 per cent owing to the low production of cotton last year. On the other hand, textile mill owners have demanded the government should decrease import duty to 4 per cent on raw cotton. It is also worth mentioning that cotton production increased by 11 per cent compared to last season. However, production was still not sufficient for the current needs.
China's lowering its cotton reserve stocks could lead to more opportunities for exports of US cotton. China has begun a long-overdue reduction of its strategic cotton reserve stocks which have hung over the world’s cotton markets since 2014.
Last summer, the Chinese government sold 12 million bales a much larger number than many analysts expected from its reserve. Now, reports say that China is expanding its textile mill capacity in Xinjiang Province. This could bring some interesting outcomes in world cotton market including the potential for higher cotton prices.
With the opening of 149 new garment and footwear factories in Cambodia last year, as many as 141 old one shut down, says a Labour Ministry report. Based on these figures, the country's garment and footwear industry remained vibrant, it is learnt.
The garment and footwear industry, which is the kingdom's biggest foreign currency earner, consists of around 1,000 factories employing 754,000 workers. Current minimum wage for the workers is 153 U.S. dollars per month. Ministry of Industry and Handicraft has estimated that the Southeast Asian country exported garment and footwear products worth 6.9 billion U.S. dollars in 2016, thus registering an increase of 4.5 per cent year-on-year.
Demands for a living wage in low income garment manufacturing hubs like Bangladesh have been dismissed as 'nonsense' by a leading free market proponent and fellow of the Adam Smith Institute in London. The comments by journalist Tim Worstall were made in the context of continued factory closures and strikes in Bangladesh by garment workers who are asking for significant increase in minimum wages that are currently the lowest in the world.
Worstall claims the only way to increase wages in poor countries such as Bangladesh, where incomes and wages are low, would be to increase the GDP. He says to drive up minimum wages over GDP per capita is unethical and not one of the things the universe allows one to do.
He suggests wages are low because productivity is low and the only solution to low wages was to increase productivity. When the average value added of labour is the same as it is in the US, everyone will be getting paid US wages. He dismissed calls for a 'living wage' by organisations such as the Asia Floor Wage Alliance. In a lighter vein he says that since people are living on those wages, obviously it is possible to live on those wages. He later stated that the people who are asking for ‘Living wages’ mean is that wages should be high enough to afford the standard of living which the campaigners desire people should have.
