Nordic fashion and textile industry is set to become the most sustainable in the world. The vision of a new Nordic action plan presented by the Nordic Ministers for the Environment in Copenhagen earlier this week is for the region to “lead the way when it comes to sustainable design, consumption, and production”, according to Norden.org, the website.of official Nordic cooperation.
The objective of the action plan is for fashion and textiles to be part of a circular economy by 2050, in which the lifetime of products is extended, and textile fibres are kept in a closed circuit in which they are used over and over again.
“We want to develop a Nordic academy for sustainable fashion and design to educate designers throughout the region in sustainability. There’s also a range of new business opportunities within green fashion – the region can contribute to solving global environmental problems while creating growth and jobs,” said Denmark’s environment minister Kirsten Brosbøl.
The fashion and textile industry’s tremendous need for water, energy, chemicals, and pesticides not only makes it one of the world’s biggest polluters, but also has devastating effects on both the environment and the people working in the industry.
The action plan for textiles, which is an initiative by the Danish Presidency of the Nordic Council of Ministers, is the first step towards making Nordic fashion the most sustainable in the world. The plan consists of a series of specific and sustainable initiatives, and is due to run until 2017.
The action plan has highlighted that significantly more water is required to produce textiles for the average Nordic consumer each year than is consumed by a Nordic three-person household. In manufacturing these textiles, the amount of carbon dioxide produced is equivalent to a 2,000-kilometre car journey.
