Germany Intends To Implement "Social Label" For Clothing

The German Federal Ministry of economic cooperation and development has launched a plan aimed at promoting "social labels" for textiles.

In July 4, 2014, the German government responded to questions from several greens congressmen, saying that the assessment of textile social and environmental quality labels was still being carried out, with a focus on the field of clothing.

The purpose of the administration is to set up quality labels for the entire garment supply chain. The labeling criteria are being designed to meet social standards, especially the working environment, reasonable remuneration, and environmental and human rights standards.

In addition, a number of NGOs and clothing manufacturers also criticized the labeling scheme in July 2014.

The Green Party seems to support the plan, but criticised the German government for its incomplete and slow pace in this regard.

It is said that a round table meeting was held with relevant institutions and people to assess and discuss the textile labeling scheme, including companies active in the German apparel industry (such as clothing company H&M), trade associations and non-governmental organizations.

The quality labelling is being considered voluntarily.

However, the German Federal Minister for economic cooperation and development Miller (Gerd M u ller) has shown that if a large number of companies fail to comply with the voluntary quality labels, the authorities will enforce mandatory regulations outside the quality labelling.

Miller also said that the authorities support the establishment of a fair trade mark (Fairtrade Textile Standard) for the fair trade cotton supply chain, including fair trade labels.

The fair trade standard for textiles covers the whole process of "cotton planting and retail".

International organization Fairtrade International is working on this standard.

Miller revealed that the textile social label aims to let German consumers know the production environment of textiles.

He said consumers should have a better understanding of the production environment of the clothes they wear in the third country, including the mainland of China.

Workers in some countries work 16 hours a day, 6 days a week, and only 5 cents a day, which is generally not enough to support their families.

If the production process of textile is in line with the ecological and social standards to be worked out, the workers in charge of production will also be able to earn a living wage.

Social labels can be issued.

Social and environmental labels will include the entire supply chain.

Responding to questions raised by German parliamentarians, Miller said that the participants involved in the round table will formulate an action plan in the summer, and will make some suggestions to make the textile field more in line with social and environmental standards, including the introduction of social and environmental quality labels for German textiles.

However, Miller's social tagging program has been criticized by many non-governmental organizations, including the world-renowned NGOs Oxfam.

Oxfam believes that the social label scheme is impractical because the plan does not regulate the entire complex textile supply chain.

Oxfam said that it is an effective and preferable way to initiate the business community to comply with the Business Social Compliance Initiative.

Under this plan, participating companies must commit themselves to improving the working environment of factories and farms.

Agate, chief executive of the Retail Trade Federation (Eggert), also criticized the social label scheme.

Agate believes that because of the complexity of the textile supply chain, it is impossible to monitor every production process of textiles.

On the other hand, the implementation of the green label social tagging program in Germany is very slow.

The Party pointed out that Miller still did not know how to make and implement social labels.

Moreover, the government may not be able to complete the preparation of social labels before the deadline of 2014, and even the timetable for the formulation and implementation of social labels is also lacking.

At present, the details of the German government's Social Label Scheme and its implementation are still unknown.