The Poison Of Fashion Is Expected To Be Eliminated.

September 20th, transnational Latest fashion H&M, a retail giant, issued a statement promising to eliminate all toxic and harmful substances in its supply chain and products by 2020.

This is the result of Zhang Kaile, director of pollution prevention and control project of Greenpeace China office.

In July 13th, the international NGO organization Greenpeace released the report. fashion "Poison" alleges that the suspected suppliers of H&M, including YOUNGOR, contained toxic substances such as nonylphenol (NP) in the waste water discharged from the textile industrial city, which was decomposed by the toxic substance nonylphenol polyoxyethylene ether (NPE) entering the water body.

Since then, Greenpeace has urged these brands to publicly commit themselves to giving up the use of this substance. Before H&M made a public commitment, Puma, Nike, Adidas and other three sporting goods brands have issued similar public commitments.

However, in September 21st, at the riverside of Fenghua, Ningbo, the sewage outlet of YOUNGOR textile industrial city is still in the state of drainage, and the air is full of strong smell of hydrogen sulphide. The sewage poured out of the pipe about 80 centimeters in diameter and poured into the Fenghua river. The Fenghua river is one of Sanjiang in Ningbo. The lower reaches confluence with Yuyao River and Yongjiang River, and finally flows into the sea.

Li Shifu, who worked in printing and dyeing factory for nearly two years, said that the industrial sewage in the entire industrial park was handled by the only sewage treatment plant closest to the riverside.

The type of work he belongs to is printing and dyeing. It is a department that produces a lot of sewage during the production process. He has not noticed that the factory has relevant treatment measures in the production process. The head of the printing and dyeing factory rejected the reporter's interview request.

In the YOUNGOR textile industrial city park, you can see many well-known foreign clothing brand advertisements, including Nike, Lining and so on. These are YOUNGOR's OEM brands.

In June 2010 and March 2011, Zhang Kai and his colleagues came here for the two time and sampled the drainage pipes along the riverside. What they are carrying out is an action of water pollution project of Greenpeace textile industry.

YOUNGOR uses an independent sewage pipe, and the waste water will not be mixed with other factories' wastewater, so they can confirm that the substance contained in the water sample comes from YOUNGOR.

　　 Youngor The textile industry city is one of the largest high-end garment and textile production bases in China. It was invested by 1 billion yuan by YOUNGOR group in 2003. Besides the production of YOUNGOR's own brand clothing, YOUNGOR also has supply relationship with Adidas, Calvin Klein, CONVERSE, H&M, Nike, and so on according to Greenpeace survey.

The two samples were sent to the Greenpeace research laboratory in Exeter University and the Omegam independent environmental analysis laboratory in Holland, where toxic substances NP was discovered. They also conducted a survey of Zhongshan Guotai dyeing and finishing Co., Ltd., located in Zhongshan, Guangdong. The results also showed that the waste water discharged from its independent sewage pipe contained NP.

From April 2011 to May, Greenpeace also purchased 78 samples of 15 garment brands in 18 countries, including China, the United Kingdom and Argentina, including sportswear, casual wear and footwear, and 13 textile producing countries such as China and Bangladesh. The samples of 2/3, including Adidas and Lining, contain NPE, after being tested by qualified third party laboratories.

In August 23rd, Greenpeace released second reports related to NPE, "fashion poison 2: poison hidden in clothes".

However, while acknowledging the supply relationship with YOUNGOR, CONVERSE, H&M, Nike and Puma did not represent the process of wet processing for Greenpeace in the YOUNGOR textile industrial city, that is to say, they did not use NPE. Greenpeace is also unable to prove which brands have used NPE's printing and dyeing links in these two textile factories.

However, the testing of samples allowed Greenpeace to believe that NPE is involved in the printing and dyeing of these clothes.

A senior person in the printing and dyeing industry said that NPE was introduced into China as an advanced technology in 1980s as a surfactant in wet printing and dyeing. NPE has good dispersing, wetting, penetrating and emulsifying functions. Moreover, because NPE is composed of 9 carbon chains, its stability is very high, and its good performance and low price make it widely used in various industries, including mechanical processing, paper making, leather and industrial monosodium glutamate production. In the past, washing powder also contained NPE.

China's first batch of experts engaged in dye research and Chen Rongqi, an expert consultant of China Dyestuff Industry Association, said that NPE is an endocrine disruptor and can cause cancer. Once it enters the environment, it will quickly decompose into a more virulent environmental hormone, NP. NP is recognized as an environmental hormone, which simulates estrogen, has an effect on the sexual development of organisms, and interferes with the endocrine of organisms and is toxic to reproductive system.

At the same time, NP has persistence and bioaccumulation, and can accumulate in food through the food chain. Therefore, even if the concentration of emission is very low, it is also very harmful. But there is no evidence that NPE or NP can be absorbed by human body through skin contact. {page_break}

In Europe, since the REACH regulations came into effect in 2005, most industries such as textile, paper making, cleaning and personal care have been banned from using and selling products with a NP or NPE content of more than 0.1%.

However, NPE is still widely used in developing countries because of its low cost and inadequate maturity.

"The use of our restricted chemicals is in compliance with local standards." In response to the media, Adidas said. About 40% of the global suppliers of the company come from China.

Puma said in its statement that in its production process, the permitted allowable value of NPE is in line with the requirements of REACH. Half of Puma's suppliers come from China.

China has no prohibition on the use of NPE, which is why these brands can use NPE in the printing and dyeing process.

The only visible restriction on NPE in China is that the Chinese government listed NP in the list of strictly restricted import and export of toxic chemicals in January this year, but the list itself does not have any impact on the textile industry and other industries using NPE.

In 2008, China has worked out an industrial production standard for NPE, which has been used up to now. People in the printing and dyeing industry said, "since the state has industrial production standards, it means that the use of NPE in China is legal."

This obviously can not convince Greenpeace, the NGO organization believes that these brands are drilling loopholes in the laws and regulations of developing countries.

Now, because of the green peace urge, some brands that are denounced by NPE pollution are beginning to feel the pressure.

After the release of the report, Greenpeace began to submit recommendations letters to the relevant brands and negotiate with them. Sometimes they also exert pressure on the brand through outside the door of the company or outside the shop.

In September 14th, the volunteers of Greenpeace launched actions in 12 countries, including China, France and Germany, to paste the word "poison free future" and "poison the Chinese river" into the window of H&M's retail store.

There are some twists and turns in dealing with Li Ning Co. In addition to the volunteers' desire to see the episode of Li Ning Co founder Lining himself, the public commitments made by Li Ning Co failed to meet their expectations.

In August 22nd, Li Ning Co issued a statement on the official website, promising that "Li Ning Co will reduce and eliminate chemicals that affect the environment in the whole production process of Li Ning Co (including shoes, clothing and sports accessories), including suppliers and raw materials suppliers from 8 to 10, to achieve environmentally friendly emissions."

And Greenpeace believes that Lining has not decided to completely eliminate toxic and harmful substances, and lacks corresponding measures to ensure that its "detoxification" process is open and transparent.

The "comprehensive" and "all" requirements of Greenpeace are not what Li Ning Co calls "reduction and elimination". The latter can leave some loopholes for some toxic substances and some emissions, and the threat to environment and health still exists. Zhang Kai said.

The Li Ning Co said in a statement that she sent some samples to the authorities for testing NPE content, which showed that Lining's products were in line with the EU REACH standard.

Greenpeace considers this to be a misreading of the regulation. The appendix 17 of the standard is about the prohibition of chemical preparations with a concentration of NPE above 0.1%, which is directed at the production process, not the finished product.

Now, Li Ning Co is still consulting with green peace on issues such as explicit commitment and information disclosure. Greenpeace thinks that as the leading brand of the industry, the behavior of these brands such as H&M and Lining can play a benchmark role in the whole industry.

Zhang Kai is satisfied with the commitment of the four brands of Puma, Adidas, Nike and H&M, and believes that their commitments include the core requirements of Greenpeace: positive commitment, clear timetable and the attitude of information disclosure. {page_break}

All four brands promise to eliminate all the toxic and harmful substances in their supply chain before 2020, covering all the brands. They also promise to make the information public. H&M said it will disclose the information on the use and discharge of toxic and harmful substances by all its subordinate suppliers before 2012.

However, in the current statement, several brands have avoided the explanation of the toxicity of NPE and the application of NPE in their respective supply chains.

In an interview with Puma, they said they had produced a manual on environmental safety standards. All materials used in production will be formally tested in the production process.

"We are conducting a survey of supplier NPE usage, and all suppliers involved in wet textile chemical processing must take part in this test." Puma said.

Greenpeace believes that all brands should establish clear strategies for companies and suppliers to achieve changes from toxic substances to safe chemicals. A practical plan with a clear timetable should also be worked out.

The fundamental way for the industry to stop using toxic substances such as NPE lies in the fact that the government has clear rules and regulations, and stipulates and restricposes the legal acts of enterprises.

According to the brand commitment of four responding brands, they will formulate and disclose the action roadmap to improve supply chain within eight weeks after the response. Now eight weeks are coming, whether these brands can abide by their commitments remains to be seen.

Making these changes means that these brands need not only to spend time and cost to identify and standardize the use of chemicals, but also to develop alternative products with the textile industry.

For suppliers, the cost of using alternative products may be increased.

Zhang Kai said that at present, it can be used as a substitute for NPE with fatty alcohol polyoxyethylene ether and other substances. But the price and performance of these alternatives are not enough to compare with NPE.

At present, some brands that are accused of Greenpeace's NPE in their products have not yet responded and promised, such as UNIQLO, G-Star Raw, Calvin Klein, Kappa, etc., and Greenpeace said they will continue to press them.