The world leader among fashion retailers in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index is Lojas Renner. A leader in omnichannel fashion retail, Brazil’s largest chain of clothing stores is also the third in general global retail, out of 7,800 companies evaluated.
What sets this company apart?
First, all of its cotton products are made from certified cotton, and second, almost all of the company’s suppliers have socio-environmental certification.
Driving change
One of its partners is FarFarm, a company that has established a flourishing network of farmers and agricultural organizations to grow cotton organically using agroforestry practices. In 2019, the two companies joined forces to develop regenerative systems for the cultivation of cotton, working with rural smallholders in Mato Grosso.
“The state of Mato Grosso is the second-largest producer of cotton in Brazil using conventional methods. This is one of the factors contributing to the fact it now has the highest rate of deforestation in the country,” said Mariana Gatti, speaking at the recent Regenerative Agriculture Summit Europe in Amsterdam. Gatti is a sustainability strategist at FarFarm.
Conventional cotton farming leads to soil degeneration due to intensive use of pesticides and contributes to climate irregularities. With the environmental damage comes water contamination, land impoverishment, income loss, and a rural exodus.
FarFarm and Renner decided to create a sustainable textile supply chain by farming cotton on plantations where trees and crops are grown together. The benefits of combining agricultural and forest land are numerous. Trees not only provide additional food, fuel, and income for farmers, but they also contribute to carbon capture, soil health, and biodiversity.
“The goal is to develop a scalable, long-term supply chain that regenerates soil, prevents deforestation, and increases the health and well-being of people,” said Gatti. “This approach increases the economic resilience of vulnerable communities. By providing education and technical assistance, we’re also increasing awareness about sustainable agriculture that will trickle down to other chains.”
Just in this past year, the project helped increase soil organic carbon by 25% and biodiversity in the form of microorganisms that promote nutrition by 16%, along with an impressive 59% increase in microorganisms that can promote carbon sequestration.
Gatti pointed out that by engaging in projects with retailers like Renner, FarFarm is helping address the challenges faced by the agricultural chains supplying the food, textile, and cosmetics industries.
“As these chains grow together, they are all facing the same socio-environmental issues that might be solved with greater data transparency and a more standardized approach,” she said. “We see a huge opportunity in empowering innovation for regeneration through cross-industry agroforestry systems. By engaging with all stakeholders, including academic research institutions, we can accelerate the speed, scale, and impact of adoption and help decrease costs.”
Collaboration such as this example between Renner and FarFarm could not be happening at a timelier moment.
Regenerating through circularity
According to the Ellen Macarthur Foundation’s exploration of Fashion and the Circular Economy, there is a huge disconnect between the growth in clothing sales and the decline in clothing utilization since the year 2000. While clothing sales have skyrocketed from 50 to 100 billion units between 2000 and 2015, the number of times a garment is worn decreased considerably to about seven times on average today in high-income countries.
The textiles industry relies mostly on take-make-waste systems using nonrenewable resources including oil to produce synthetic fibers, fertilizers to grow cotton, and chemicals to produce dyes. After use, most garments end up in landfill. This linear system puts pressure on resources, pollutes and degrades the natural environment, and creates significant negative societal impacts at local, regional, and global scales.
The topic of regenerative agriculture is not new when it comes to food production, but the Regenerative Agriculture Summit Europe was the first time this leading global event unified the food and textile industries to accelerate regenerative agriculture practices through partnership and harmonization.
Other speakers in the textile tracks included
● The Secretary General of the International Wool Textile Organization (IWTO)
● A representative of a luxury designer brand committed to using 100% natural materials from regenerative agriculture or closed-loop recycling by 2030
● The CEO of a brand that makes wool sweaters from animal-friendly livestock farming
These experts agree that to achieve the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals, it’s not enough to adhere to conventional practices that simply mean staying within the law or even sustainable ones that add no additional harm.
As a society, we must move away from an extractive, fossil-fuel-dependent landscape that exploits human and natural resources and leads to the breakdown of climate systems. To ensure the long-term health of the planet and its living systems, we must embrace a fully regenerative model that seeks to restore, replenish, and revitalize the world around us.
The good news is that many players in the food supply chain, large and small, are already digitalizing farming processes and services.
SAP Intelligent Agriculture, for example, helps agribusiness companies increase farming efficiency. The solution improves data quality and connects existing data sets to increase productivity and gain valuable insights, according to Anja Strothkaemper, vice president of agribusiness and commodity management, SAP who was speaking at the same event.
