On October the 25th the French Chamber of Commerce had the pleasure of having Tobias Fischer, CSR Project & Relations Manager at H&M, as key note speaker at a lunch conference at Sheraton. 50 members had gathered to listen to the representative of one of the most well-known Swedish groups. 

The title of the lecture was Sustainability – H&M’s Achievements and Challenges and Tobias talked about the sustainability strategy of H&M and how they work with these questions as an integrated part of all activities of the group. Tobias has previously been working with CSR questions for 11 years in Bangladesh, India and Hong Kong for H&M.

H&M is a customer driven company, but also a value driven and cost conscious company. The sustainability work must therefore be balanced taking all these aspects in account.

With 87 000 employees, more than 2 300 stores in 41 countries and around 700 direct suppliers H&M is one of the biggest fashion companies in the world, but still the company needs to cooperate with other companies, stakeholders, NGO’s as well as other organizations in order to achieve improvements in the production chain in the countries where the clothes are produced.

H&M does not own any factories and hire suppliers for production. Regarding monitoring the factories H&M regularly audit the suppliers’ factories. In general the audit process involves an inspection of the factory site, management as well as worker interviews and an examination of company files and records.
 It is more difficult to control the suppliers’ subcontractors going backwards in the production chain from the cotton farmer to the dyed fabric ready to use in the factory. H&M is rarely the only buyer at any factory and collaboration between various actors is needed in order to contribute to a positive development throughout the entire industry. H&M engage with other brands to improve the working conditions in the textile industry as we regard industry wide standards as competition neutral

H&M has been working with CSR and sustainability for a long time but a couple of years ago the company launched the H&M "Conscious actions"; seven commitments that every department of the group has to follow and measure:

1. Provide fashion for conscious customers
Make products with an added sustainability value.

2.  Choose and reward responsible partners
Work with partners who share our values and commit to continuously improving their social and environmental practices. Work closely with our direct suppliers to support these improvements. And we work increasingly to use our influence to raise standards even further down our value chain.

3. Be ethical
Always act with integrity and respect.

4. Be climate smart
Be energy efficient and inspire others to reduce total CO2 emissions. For example, in 2010 approximately 1,400 tonnes CO2-e were saved through more efficient lighting in new H&M stores.

5. Reduce, reuse, recycle
Aim for zero waste to landfill.
In 2010 1600 tonnes of recycled materials turned into new clothes.

6. Use natural resources responsibly
Conserve water, soil, air and species.
Cotton production is very water intensive and a lot of pesticides and chemicals are used. There are big benefits both for the producer and the environment to find better ways of producing cotton. The Better Cotton Initiative aims for growing cotton in a way that aims to reduce stress on the local environment and improve the livelihoods and welfare of farming communities. 68.000 cotton farmers have been trained on more sustainable farming techniques through the Better Cotton Initiative.

H&M has become the world´s biggest user of organic cotton. H&M used more than 15.000 tonnes of organic cotton in 2010 and the commitment to organic cotton continues. The H&M target is to use only cotton from more sustainable sources by 2020. Beside Better Cotton, which soon will be introduced in the H&M range, organic cotton and also recycled cotton are keys to achieving this target.

7. Strengthen communities
Contribute to the development of the communities where we operate.

There were many questions from the interested audience and it seemed that the Q&A session could have been continuing the whole afternoon.

To summarize, a lot has been achieved since the nineties and the sustainability is now an integrated part of business decisions. However, there are still a lot of challenges, especially further down the value chain. 

Here beolw some pictures from the event.
Text and photo: Krisitna Hulteberg, French Chamber of Commerce 

Tobias Fischer from H&M

Attentive audience

Pierre Maurice Aflalo, chairman of the French Chamber of Commerce
and Tobias Fischer from H&M