Members contribute to this by committing to measure and improve their social and environmental sustainability performance, using the Higg Index suite of measurement and management tools.
Given the tremendous amount of resources and hard work invested in the SAC, Michael Schragger, founder of the Sustainable Fashion Academy, felt it appropriate to discuss and debate the impact of these tools – and the SAC in general.
In this episode, he speaks with Dara O’Rourke, associate professor at the University of California, Berkeley, and co-author of a report assessing whether the SAC’s Facilities Environmental Module (FEM) and the act of standardising, measuring and reporting has resulted in meaningful improvements.
[sc_embed_player_template1 fileurl=https://traffic.libsyn.com/secure/bigclosetssmallplanet/BCSP_20201123_hot-off-the-press_is-higg-working-dara-orourke_uc.mp3?dest-id=697334]
O’Rourke presents what he sees as the strengths and weaknesses of the FEM and explains the report’s recommendations for increasing the SAC’s impact.
He tells Schragger: “It’s a really critical time to be evaluating programmes like the SAC and their attempts to govern global supply chains.
“The big question for me it how can we effectively and democratically govern both the positive aspects – job creation, economic development opportunities and the products we want – while minimising the downside – the impacts on labour, on communities, on the environment, and on our production and our consumption.”
On top of this, Schragger and O’Rourke talk consumer psychology and communication, data, the limits of voluntary industry standards and monitoring, and why there are no silver bullets.
You can listen to the full, uninterrupted podcast HERE.
