An initiative launched at the Future for Fashion event has been the Pact for Sustainable Fashion, with the participation of researchers, university students and companies in the the fashion industry from the last two countries to have hosted the aforementioned climate summits, Spain and Scotland. This pact aims to revolutionize the fashion industry by inviting large companies within the fashion industry to implement three specific actions in their production processes: contribute to the sustainability of the planet from within the company, measure the sustainability actions that are implemented and inspire society in terms of sustainability.
The pact consists of companies designing a KPI, or indicator that measures the impact of a specific action or process. The signatory companies will be in charge of designing and implementing this indicator, whatever it may be, as part of their company policies. Subsequently, they will have to present their results and make them public, so that, if it is a useful indicator, it can be adopted by other companies and claimed by consumers.
“The original idea was to introduce sustainability in hiring, organizational changes or in the supply chain, but the power of this pact lies in the ease that others have to copy them, in making the change go viral. It’s not about companies looking for complicated formulas for changing things, rather that this is a way to combat greenwashing,” says Esteban Galán, professor at Campus Gandia of the Universitat Politècnica de València (UPV) and researcher in the SFES project, which aims to embrace the implementation of sustainability strategies and foster employability skills for the fashion industry. The project is led by the Glasgow Caledonian University with five European academic partners.
Any improvements in the fashion industry are also the most widespread gender politics that can be implemented worldwide, since 75% of the employees are women,” says Galán. “Sustainability is part of the value of fashion brands, with 40% of consumers considering it very important when making a purchase. If the industry aligns its business objectives with sustainable development, any growth in this regard results in an increase in revenue.”
During the Future of Fashion event, professors Esteban Galán and Nadia Alonso, researchers at Campus Gandia, and professor Lindsey Drylie Carey, from Glasgow Caledonian University and principal investigator at SFES, participated in the workshop A New Way of Communicating: Measuring Sustainability Through Charismatic Actions in the Fashion Industry. The workshop identified communication as an opportunity to increase the value of sustainability in the fashion industry.
The collaboration of the UPV in Future of Fashion is one more support space for this academic institution in the context of Valencia World Capital of Design 2022. In line with this, the year 2022 has seen the UPV participating and hosting different exhibitions, workshops and talks that have helped to disseminate this status as capital.
