Walmart Set New Goals For Sustainable Textiles

Retail giant WAL-MART (Walmart) proposed to sell in American stores, using a range of sustainable clothing, including purchasing more sustainable fibers, and working with suppliers to reduce the environmental impact of manufacturing.

The retailer (Walmart) previously announced its new goals at its 2019 Summit on sustainable development in April 10th, and together with NGOs, industry groups, governments and suppliers, explained the latest status of its procurement work to improve the lives of the workers in the supply chain of the global apparel industry, with particular emphasis on women.

WAL-MART (Walmart) said its goal is to strengthen its commitment to sustainable textiles, which can be divided into two categories: purchasing more sustainable fibers and reducing the impact of manufacturing processes.

One of the first goals is that the retailer (Walmart) promises to increase the use of recycled polyester fibers, set the target of using 50% recycled fiber content by 2025 and purchase 100% sustainable cotton.

In addition, as part of the reduction of environmental impact, by 2022, WAL-MART (Walmart) American stores will only purchase garments and home textiles from only the Higg index facility environment module (FEM) of the sustainable clothing alliance, and the suppliers of textile factories. It helps the factory to evaluate self-assessment tools for sustainability performance and share results with supply chain partners in the areas of water use, waste, emissions and chemicals management.

At the same time, WAL-MART (Walmart) will also prioritize perpetual chemistry and set goals to reduce the emissions of key chemicals in the textile manufacturing process.

Gigaton project

During the summit, the retail giant also announced that WAL-MART (Walmart) Canada Company will join the Gigaton project, which is a platform for cooperation between retailers and suppliers, so as to avoid the global value chain's emissions up to 1 billion metric tons per Gigabyte by 2030.

Canada (Walmart) is the third international market in which the company is working with suppliers to reduce emissions.

In the first two years of the Gigaton project, WAL-MART (Walmart) said that many suppliers had already achieved their goals and avoided 9300 tonnes of emissions.

Efforts are made to make it easier for the more than 1000 suppliers who are already involved in the platform. WAL-MART (Walmart) also plans to issue the Gigaton Calculators (Gigaton Calculators), which is designed by WAL-MART (Walmart) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs) as suppliers, and is used for the progress of suppliers' project objectives.

"We are encouraged by the involvement of suppliers in Gigaton projects," said Kathleen McLaughlin, senior vice president and chief sustainability officer of WAL-MART (Walmart). To achieve our ambitious climate goals, expand and deepen project involvement and contacts. Up to now, the progress of participation shows how the company can contribute to the climate through the actual actions of the entire product supply chain. Ultimately, the establishment of a sustainable development supply chain requires everyone to participate - not just our employees and suppliers, but the collective actions of customers, general enterprises and the private sector.

WAL-MART also outlined progress towards 100% renewable energy power targets - Powered by renewable energy for 50% of the operation by the end of 2025. In the past year, the retailer has completed 136 new contracts for solar energy and wind energy projects, which will provide an additional 2 billion 140 million kilowatt hours of renewable energy per year - equivalent to the electricity consumption of over 260000 households in a whole year.