…And Miles to Go…

With a 4% share of the global trade in textiles and apparel, the Indian market is set to touch $190 billion by 2025–26. The sector—with a diverse, huge and complicated value chain—employs a humungous 45 million people, the size of a country in some parts of the globe!

The fragmented character of the supply chain and the nature of the materials used make this industry one of the most destructive. While elsewhere in the world, stringent checks and a movement towards sustainability are on the rise from among industry stakeholders themselves, India very clearly still has a long way to go.

Not unless, it tags these tens of thousands of these ubiquitous SMEs along.

Yet, India with a burgeoning 1.3 billion population, an industry that is spread across the length and breadth of the country, a 7,516km vulnerable coastline and four biodiversity hotpots, makes for a geo-political entity that will have a critical role to play in a sustainable future as well as a battle against the climate crisis—not just for itself, but for the world as a whole.

In this, the country’s textiles-apparel-fashion industry has its mantle well cut out.

And again, the urgent need to start somewhere. A beginning came about when the Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI) instituted the first Sustainability Awards across three categories early this year. [texfash.com came in as the knowledge partner to nudge the industry to chart out an aggressive path with both planet and people at the centre of all activities.]

The aim of the awards, the first ever by an industry body, is two-pronged: (i) recognise efforts currently being made towards sustainability; (ii) incentivise others to tread the same path. The broad objective is to trigger a cascading effect: that of innovation and pragmatic work.

The awards were open to Indian enterprises, working across the textile-apparel-fashion value chain.

The CITI Sustainability Awards were initiated across three pathways: Award I: Progress Towards Sustainability; Award II: Expanding Circularity; Award III: Award for Reyclers — all these meant to push entrepreneurs and organisations to go sustainable by making sustainability not just about mandatory compliances, but the very ethos of the company. If the two Ps of Planet and People are met, the third P – profit — is a natural consequence.

Circularity will have to increasingly become a part of the textile-apparel industry. The pre- and post-consumer waste, the missing economies at the drawing board, in design and across the supply chain — all these and more are imperatives that need to be taken up with urgency.

The awards tried to probe if an enterprise has embarked on the path of sustainability and transparency, does it have a policy statement that spells out its sustainability roadmap, does it source the right raw materials from vendors who practice sustainability, does it ensure responsible production, does it follow mandatory compliances when it comes to usage of natural resources, does the business make a positive impact on the environment around and a lot more.

The application process also questioned the recycle, reuse, reduce and gradually a cradle-to-grave approach as an organisation or even as an entrepreneur what steps are taken to go circular; whether there have been any standout innovations that could be adopted by other enterprises too; whether indeed an enterprise has a roadmap for the next two years that talks about going circular.

If truth be told, there was no deluge of applications (deadline too was short), and what cannot be denied is that the movement towards sustainability, transparency and circularity has gained traction. There are pockets where work is on in a sustained manner, and then there are regions like the one I spoke where a lot of groundwork will be required to even get them going on this path. While for the exporters all of this is a given, there is also that lot which was already recycling a lot of pre and post-consumer waste but was oblivious that its business was geared towards a positive environment.  

Geetanjali Woollens, which was the first runner-up in the Award for Recyclers category, is a case in point. The business was started 55 years ago by Surendra Goel at a time when “nobody knew the meaning of or cared about sustainability. It was a business formed out of a need to provide cost-effective woollen garments and blankets to people who had only recently gained freedom and were not as better-off as they are today and could barely afford clothes, let alone fancy ones to keep them warm in harsh winters. The recycling of textiles was an answer to the government’s pleas to entrepreneurs to produce quality low-cost woollen blankets and garments not only for the citizenry, but also for the army which was fighting wars with China and Pakistan in the cold mountains of Kashmir and the Northeast with limited resources,” informs Deepak Goel, the Gen Next Director.

“This company continued with its business of recycling of textiles and selling them to clients worldwide. “In many cases, we used to keep quiet and not inform the clients that the products were made from recycled textiles. It is only around 2015 that we were introduced to the world of ‘sustainability’ when one of our clients from the Netherlands enlightened us that what we had been doing for so many decades quietly was now the rage the world over. This is when we realised the true potential of our recycling work and decided to start screaming from the rooftops about what we do and how we have been doing it for so many decades!”

At first, says Deepak, it was hard getting appointments with the brands’ teams at their headquarters, and harder still to travel from India with so many samples.

Talking about how the policy for sustainability was eventually drafted, he contends: “Policies are always a work in progress. We need to constantly evolve to remain in the race. If we think we have done enough, we will be left behind. So, there is constant work being done on fine-tuning our policies with inputs from stakeholders—be it workers, suppliers or clients.”

Geetanjali Woollens emerged as a runner-up and the award says Deepak, “shows the appreciation of the work we have been doing for the last 5+ decades. Surely, it will help create recognition of our work to the global community who may not be aware of who we are and what we do. Awards like these also help in framing more favourable government policies for recycling. Our immediate goal now is to shore up our marketing efforts for global brands and increase the size of our marketing team to attract new clients from global and local brands to embrace the idea of utilising mechanically recycled post-consumer textiles in their collection.”

It was different for Pratibha Syntex — the winner in the Expanding Circularity award category. Sustainability is a fundamental aspect of the Pratibha business strategy. The company acknowledges the social and environmental consequences of its operations and strives to become a responsible global organisation by adhering to the triple bottom line principle (focusing on people, planet, and profit) as a key element of its overall performance management strategy. Pratibha has design principles that focus on recyclability, the use of recycled content and minimising waste, and implementing them in an appropriate business model, its application claimed.

Responding to a question on when its sustainability policy was drafted, and what was the immediate context, a spokesperson said: “Pratibha Syntex had the vision to be a global leader in sustainable textile products and practices. It was in 2018 that our sustainability head Mrinal Bose came up with an idea to come up with a policy that defines our plan of action. He diligently carried out research of our processes and laid down a policy that syncs with our vision.”  

The policy, which was drafted after meticulous and in-depth research of the processes, defined which areas to focus to attain the goals. The policy was drafted by the sustainability department, and it was reviewed by six vice-presidents and the managing director. “The major inputs were to incorporate 100% water stewardship, utilisation of renewable energy and energy-efficient machines, and minimising waste.”

To communicate the policy “that has given shape to our aspirations” all through the organisation, the sustainability department carried out awareness programmes by undertaking training sessions in between the working hours. The award, the spokesperson said, “is a reflection of our efforts. Recognition always boosts morale and inspires to do more good. We are delighted.”

Progress Towards Sustainability was the other award category which was bagged by RSWM Ltd, an LNJ Bhilwara company. “The development of a sustainability policy involves a thorough review of the company's environmental impact and an analysis of potential areas for improvement. These policies outline our commitment to reducing their environmental footprint and increasing their social responsibility. This review, conducted by a dedicated sustainability team, involves inputs from stakeholders such as customers, suppliers, employees, and community members.

“Once the policy has been developed, it is approved by senior management and implemented throughout the organisation. The policy includes targets and timelines for achieving specific sustainability goals, with regular reporting mechanisms in place to track progress and identify areas for further improvement,” reveals Suketu Shah, the Chief Executive at the Fabric Division.

The team formulating the policy comprises individuals from different departments such as quality assurance, corporate social responsibility, operations, sustainability committees, cross-functional teams, and external experts. The policy is reviewed and revised based on the feedback received from stakeholders. There is also an internal review process to ensure that the sustainability policies are consistent with overall business strategy, values, and objectives.

Once the policy is finalised, it is communicated to all employees and stakeholders by the core team through seminars, presentations, emails and banners.

Developing a sustainability policy, underscores Shah, is an iterative process that involves multiple stakeholders, and the level of satisfaction with the final policy document depending on stakeholders' perspectives and expectations. However, it is crucial to ensure that the policy development process is transparent, collaborative, and consultative to achieve a comprehensive and effective sustainability policy. “An award motivates an organisation to continue to improve its sustainability practices and differentiate itself from competitors. Enhancing the back-end, we focus on data management and reporting strategies, supply chain sustainability, carbon and energy management and employee engagement for sustainability priorities and goals.”

The winner in the Recycler Award category was the Punjab headquartered Usha Yarns which is into recycling cotton waste (textile cutting waste-pre-consumer). Expressing happiness at receiving the award — to be recognised by CITI is hugely satisfying and encouraging to continue our effort — Managing Director Anurag Gupta recounts how when the journey stated in 2007 with the installation of its first recycling line, “we were just toying with the idea of blending recycled fibre with cotton.”

“We have been, principally, operating on a circular business model since inception. We only consume waste as a raw material to produce recycled yarn for garment manufacture/sale by sustainable brands. We have been directly collaborating in India with brands/manufacturers to recycle their waste back to produce yarn which in turn is used as raw material for new garments, again, being sold by such brands.

“The true journey towards conscious sustainability started in 2010 with the launch of yarns made from 100% recycled fibres. In the beginning, most of the customers were those who bought our products for a saving on their raw material costs. It was only around 2015 that customers showed interest in GRS certifications which we had not used for almost two years. Suddenly, we found customers evincing interest and it was time for us to put together a sustainability policy and start walking the talk.

“Ours was a small company back then and an internal consensus was not challenging as we were already finding huge customer interest in our products and being the only ones in India at that time the whole journey started becoming exciting.”

When a policy was finally put in place, everyone in the organisation was happy “as we got into overdrive, trying to expand and improve our product offerings. Suddenly, we found ourselves at the centrestage of recycling activity that was raging all around in the textiles industry.”