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Canada Launching Initiative to Reduce Waste in Textile Industry

Canada Launching Initiative to Reduce Waste in Textile Industry

Induja from Trace
July 11, 2024

Happy Thursday!

We’re excited to kick off our newsletter this week with a discussion on what’s going on in the industry. In conversation this week we’ll dive into the Canadian government’s efforts to reduce waste in the fashion space.

We want to dive deeper into a key aspect of addressing the industry’s impact: measuring impact, particularly with carbon emissions reporting. We’ll also share an update on the latest and greatest of companies in the sustainable fashion space.

We’re also excited to share some of our own tips on how you can help reduce the waste that comes from the fashion industry!

Thanks for reading!

Headlines

Canada has launched a consultation to address plastic waste in the textile and apparel sector. This initiative, led by Environment Minister Steven Guilbeault, aims to develop a roadmap for reducing plastic waste and enhancing circularity. This initiative has been a long time coming; since 2018, the government of Canada has collaborated with major stakeholders to advance research on microfibre pollution and assess challenges and opportunities to reduce waste.

The consultation invites feedback until September 1, 2024, and focuses on redesign, reduction, reuse, repair, and recycling of textiles. Currently, about 98% of plastic textile waste in Canada ends up in landfills, contributing significantly to microplastic pollution. In fact, textiles are the 5th largest contributor of plastic waste in Canada. The feedback will help create a draft roadmap to be published later this year.

For more details, you can read the full article here.

Analysis of the Week

Carbon accounting is the process of quantifying the number of greenhouse gasses (GHGs) produced directly and indirectly from a business or organization’s activities within a set of boundaries. There are three types of emissions that are classified as follows:

Categorization	Definition
Scope 1	These are emissions released directly from sources owned or controlled by the organization, such as from the company’s manufacturing processes.
Scope 2	These are emissions released indirectly from the organization's activities such as electricity, steam, heating and cooling.
Scope 3	These are emissions that come indirectly from related activities not owned and controlled by the organization, such as activities across the company’s supply chain. These are also typically the most difficult emissions for an organization to identify and report.

Categorization

Definition

Scope 1

These are emissions released directly from sources owned or controlled by the organization, such as from the company’s manufacturing processes.

Scope 2

These are emissions released indirectly from the organization's activities such as electricity, steam, heating and cooling.

Scope 3

These are emissions that come indirectly from related activities not owned and controlled by the organization, such as activities across the company’s supply chain. These are also typically the most difficult emissions for an organization to identify and report.

A high-quality carbon footprint represents the total of a company’s greenhouse gas emissions, including Scopes 1-3, and serves as the basis for the company’s emissions reduction goals and progress. Regulatory frameworks in the US, EU, and elsewhere require many companies to disclose their carbon footprint annually.

For many fashion companies, reporting on Scope 3 emissions will be a challenge due to much of the supply chain being outsourced to factories in other countries, not to mention the limited oversight many brands have over their suppliers. However, this reporting will be crucial to hold companies accountable for their impact.

Sustainability Tips of the Week

Welcome back to our series where we share tips for buying, maintaining, and disposing of clothes sustainably.

Today we’ll discuss sustainable, easy to dispose of your clothing. When you take your clothes to donation centers (i.e. Goodwill, Salvation Army), a good majority of the donations don’t get resold or used. Approximately 13M tons of clothes donated yearly get sent to landfills or get incinerated, while only 2.5M get recycled.

How can we dispose of clothes more responsibly? Here are a few methods:

Textile Recycling Programs - Many large cities have textile recycling programs where they will accept old items that aren’t good enough to be donated such as old cotton t-shirts. ThredUp, the popular online thrift store, will recycle any clothes that you send that cannot be sold.
Small businesses - There are many small businesses you can find locally or online that will accept old fabric as resources to upcycle them into new products. Our brand partner, Basic Britches is a great example of a small business that collects excess t-shirts to turn them into underwear.
Local Buy-Nothing Groups - Look for local groups via social media that share unused items among other members. This is often the best option for clothing that is made from less sustainable material. Someone in these groups might have a creative way to upcycle your clothing or find use for it. Another alternative to this, is creating groups with friends in your area to swap clothing with one another.

Innovation in Fashion

Fibe - Textile manufacturer on the cutting edge that’s turning waste from potato harvests to usable, sustainable threads

Otrium - Online fashion outlet that partners with designer brands to sell older collections at a discounted price and prevent them from going to landfills

Retykle - Online platform to buy and sell second-hand children’s wear

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