Consumer demand for jeans is as high as ever, but are market leaders shrinking ethical standards to fit profit margins? Nicola Scott and Mary Rayner investigate.
The value of the UK jeans market is rising from £887
million in 2000, to an estimated £1.8 billion by 2010.(1) This increase
is in part due to the widespread availability of low-priced jeans in large
retail outlets and supermarkets.
While established brands such as Levi’s,
Wrangler and Lee are still dominant, high street stores including Marks
& Spencer, Diesel, Next and Gap(2) are increasing their share of the
jeans market by utilising their economies of scale and overseas production
networks.
However, is the price of jeans being kept low through the use
of cheap labour and controversial fabric technologies, or do recent developments
in corporate social responsibility (CSR) strategies by some of the world’s
leading companies signal a real change in their operations?
Workers' rights
Since January 2005 apparel workers in Mexico for the Lajat
Group, a jeans supplier to Levi Strauss & Co, have been embroiled in
a bitter dispute over job protection, workplace safety and the establishment
of an independent and democratic union at the company’s maquila factory
in Gomez Palacio, Durango.(3)
After workers called for a new union to replace
the existing “company-friendly” local branch of the Confederation
of Mexican Workers, Lajat managers announced the closure of the factory
early last year.(4)
Since then, although Lajat initially reopened the plant
due to intense worker and civil society pressure, it has laid off the majority
of its workers. A lawyer representing some of the company’s employees,
Federico Oreilly, has allegedly received threats by the company calling
for an end to his work with union members.(5)
However, such developments have taken place within the context of greater awareness by jeans companies of their responsibility for working conditions outside their home countries.
For example, in March 2006 six leading firms including Gap Inc, Levi's and Phillips-Van Huesen (co-owners of Calvin Klein Inc.), sent a joint letter to the Governor of Puebla (Mexico), Mario Marin, urging him to ensure the safety of the president of the Human and Labour Rights Commission of the Tehuacan Valley, Martin Barrios.(6) In recent months Mr Barrios has been arrested and intimidated for trying to improve the rights of garment workers in Puebla, while Governor Marin has opposed Barrios' work in order to please factory owners.(6)
Little progress
Although actions like this letter are important, our table
of brands indicates that there has been little progress against ECRA’s
ethical ratings since our last jeans report in 2002 (issue 76). The only
company to have improved its supply chain policy is Marks & Spencer.
Also significant however is Calvin Klein’s accreditation in 2005 by
the US-based Fair Labor Association (FLA). Like the UK’s Ethical Trading
Initiative (ETI, see EC 98), the FLA is a non-profit organisation that combines
the efforts of industry representatives, educational establishments and
civil society organisations to protect and improve workers’ rights
through the promotion of international labour standards.(7)
Jeans, genes and nanotech
Because of the prevalence of GM cotton in the industry, those
companies without a specific GM-free policy now receive a mark in the GE
column of the table opposite.
Issues surrounding high-tech
fabrics also include those related to the potential role of nanotechnology
within the sector (see also the Sunscreens article in this issue). In 2003
a report published by the UK’s Economic and Social Research Council
described how nanotech “smart textiles” have been incorporated
into the cotton used in jeans to make “stain and crease resistant fabric”.(8)
More recent developments include jeans with specific brand-associated smells.(9)
Companies with involvement in nanotechnology receive marks in the Pollution
& Toxics column.
New organic brands
Alternative brands which include certified ethical standards
as a key part of their operations are making their way into the market.
The UK has seen the first ever pair of Fairtrade cotton and organic jeans
by Hug.
A Dutch-based company, Kuyichi sells certified organic jeans in
shops across the UK such as Dr Kruger, Hurleys and Nasty. The company encourages
its fabric producers in Peru to become shareholders in Kuyichi in order
to make the company more accountable to all those who work for it.
Kuyichi is also a member of MADE-BY, a Dutch network of socially responsible fashion
labels. Greenfibres, based in the UK, sell organic cotton jeans for men.
As an alternative Greenfibres also sells jeans made from certified
organic hemp. Unlike non-organic cotton which relies upon irrigated land,
pesticides, weed-killers and artificial fertilisers, hemp fabric is easier
to grow organically and can be produced in the UK.(10) Another company offering
hemp jeans is Hemp Union (01482 225328).
Links
References
1 Mintel Essentials 04/05
2 See EC 98 January/February 2006
for a report on clothes shops
3 www.nosweat.org.uk 27/4/06
4
www.globalexchange.org
5 www.coalitionforjustice.net 5/4/06
6 www.maquilasolidarity.org 5/4/06
7 www.fairlabor.org 18/4/06
8
Wood, S. et al, The Social and Economic Challenges of Nanotechnology 2003
9 www.rsc.org 3/5/06
10 www.bioregional.com 17/5/06
11 www. levistrauss.com 5/4/06
12 www.levistrauss.com 9/5/06
13 www.vfc.com 18/4/06
14 www. matalan.co.uk 10/5/06
15 www.fairlabor.org
18/4/06
16 www.nosweat.org.uk 10/5/06
17 www.fcuk.com 10/5/06