World leaders gear up to tackle biodiversity loss. Fashion should pay attention #261

Fashion’s impact on the natural world is massive, but for years few brands were factoring that into sustainability plans. Now, biodiversity, the focus of a UN conference taking place this month, is gaining attention.

With much of fashion’s sustainability efforts centered on climate as focus turns to the UN COP26 conference in Glasgow, the industry has largely overlooked its role in biodiversity loss. Now, the unprecedented decline in nature is the focus of another UN conference being held in China next week.

From deforestation to plummeting soil biodiversity and water pollution, fashion has led to degradation or destruction of ecosystems around the world and at every step of the supply chain. More attention to the issue from policymakers means that fashion is starting to face pressure to act. Some independent initiatives, and a small but growing number of brands, are mapping out strategies for progress. The most progressive are pushing to address both climate change and biodiversity loss at once, recognising the issues are two sides of the same coin.

“We’re still in that environment where it’s relatively rarefied air for companies to engage in biodiversity, but the topic has picked up significantly in the last 12 months,” says Mike Korchinsky, founder of Wildlife Works, a company that sells Redd+ carbon credits that it says also protects threatened forests and wildlife and works with local communities to create paths for economic development. “There weren’t independent conversations going on about biodiversity a couple years ago. Now, almost all of our corporate clients are interested in biodiversity as [its own] conversation.”

The UN Biodiversity Conference will bring global leaders together to agree a new set of goals for nature over the next decade. The framework sets out ambitious plans to implement actions that transform society’s relationship with biodiversity and, by 2050, ensure the shared vision of “living in harmony with nature” is fulfilled. The conference will also seek fair and equitable sharing of benefits from the use of nature.

A number of fashion brands’ environmental efforts have had some positive implications for biodiversity — the growth of organic cotton is likely to be good for soil health, for example, and improvements in wastewater treatment can be positive for aquatic ecosystems downstream. However, initiatives have been scattered and not part of a comprehensive or deliberate plan for conserving nature.

By some measures, this is starting to change. Kering launched its biodiversity strategy in June 2020. Gucci president and CEO Marco Bizzarri has said that protecting biodiversity “is intrinsically linked to ensuring supply chain resilience for our sector”. French shoe brand Veja has written specific aspects of biodiversity conservation into its supplier contracts — for example by paying native rubber tappers for the raw material they harvest and for conserving the ecosystem it comes from, and buying cotton only from farmers who plant a diversity of crops. There’s also an expanding array of resources available to guide the work, and the industry is responding. Independent organisations and companies including the Wildlife Friendly Enterprise Network, Science Based Targets Network, Conservation International and Wildlife Works — which help preserve ecosystems by working within supply chains or involving local communities in nature-based carbon credits, among other methods — all say that more and more, fashion brands are seeking partnerships and expertise.

“The sector definitely has a role to play, from production through to processing. And while many of these issues are still largely invisible to both brands and their consumers, these issues are getting some sunlight via some really important initiatives now,” says Julie Stein, co-founder and executive director of the Wildlife Friendly Enterprise Network. The company works with brands, farmers and others to make their supply chains more supportive of wildlife populations, by, for example, addressing habitat fragmentation or overgrazing on wool farms, or constructing more appropriate fencing to allow migration.

Read the full article on Vogue Business