Our new guide to textile multistakeholder initiatives will help stakeholders throughout the value chain decide which MSI to engage – if any.
For many involved in textile and fashion supply chains, choosing the right multistakeholder initiative (MSI) has become just as bewildering as choosing an environmental standard or label – given that many of these initiatives now overlap.
That’s why for our loyal, existing subscribers, we’ve produced a new, useful, 60-page guide to textile sector MSIs – the first time that this type of guide has ever been published. It will be useful for brands, retailers, suppliers, and other textile sector stakeholders. We think it’s also a useful and objective way to keep an eye on the people who claim to be keeping an eye on others in the industry. After all, MSIs are – and should be – fully accountable themselves.
In the Guide we cover what we feel are the top 20 or so textile industry MSIs, and we’d like to thank them all for their willing cooperation on this project. The only requested MSI that declined to take part was the Ellen MacArthur Foundation – although we managed to write its entry ourselves. It can be seen on the sample pages we have provided here.
Yet the new MSI Guide is not designed to be a ‘critical resource’ or a ‘name-and-shame’ guidebook. Rather, we see it as a useful tool for our readers should they take the careful decision to engage with a third-party MSI. It aims to be a clear, structured resource that helps companies navigate these organisations, understand their value, and make informed choices about who to engage based on their own specific needs and goals.
It should enable readers to choose the right MSI to work with based on an organisation’s primary goals? This is especially true given the siren calls from MSIs will be loud, the offers bright and brash and compelling. Of course they will be. These organisations all have a product to sell.
A good MSI should have a clear goal and a problem to solve, and the right tools to tackle it, reliable partners, and the internal and external infrastructure to do the job well. Its offer and costs and conditions should be clear from the outset.
To address this, we have structured this report around governance, organisation, activities, outputs, and funding, as well as how MSIs communicate.
How do I get the MSI Guide?
You need to be at least a subscriber to Ecotextile News otherwise you can purchase a printed guide.
Subscribers can view a digitised version of our MSI Guide by logging into their membership account on this website and simply visiting our ‘Back Issues’ section.
Non-subscribers can purchase a 60-page printed copy at the MCL News & Media website.
Can subscribers get printed copies?
Yes, new and existing subscribers can purchase a copy at a special 20% discounted rate. Email [email protected] for an invoice.
Although the remit of this new publication is to provide a snapshot – and not an in-depth forensic investigation to textile sector MSIs, Ecotextile News is considering this as an option for a further more detailed edition.
Watch out for further news in 2026.
