Businesses Battling Nature Loss: A Closer Look at Their Efforts
While hundreds of businesses have taken steps to reduce their emissions, many business executives are becoming worried about their environmental implications beyond the climate.
Society can solve the climate issue, but only if we acknowledge the need to address the natural catastrophe as well. Climate change is only one of several severe and interconnected challenges confronting the world’s global commons, which serve as the basis of human well-being.
Under the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi), around 800 of the world’s largest corporations have pledged to do ‘enough’ to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
This is the time when businesses take a pledge to prioritize nature’s positives and reverse the damage that has already been done.
Let’s Have a Look at Statistics!
A simple cotton t-shirt consumes 2,700 liters of water. A pair of jeans requires at least 40% more water. What is further appalling is that even a single bottle of shampoo is essentially 80% water-laced with chemicals.
Not to mention the number of trees that are felled to create particular products. Palm oil, for example, is used in detergents, chocolates, and biscuits. Palm oil cultivation has culminated in the destruction of vast areas of forest cover.
From 2000 to 2018, palm oil cultivation alone resulted in an average of 629,000 hectares of deforestation each year, according to the UN’s FAO (Food and Agriculture Organization). That is the equivalent of nearly 11.7 lakh football fields! Ultimately, when we discard all of these things and their packaging, they accumulate in landfills and harm the environment.
It is possible to manufacture consumer goods while minimizing environmental impact. Products can truly become more environmentally friendly.
It is possible to produce new things, replenish the environment, and not harm what is left of it. But first, one must identify the issue. at hand. This is the conundrum that producers and manufacturers are today confronted with.
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See, polyester is inexpensive and easily integrated with other fibers. As a result, manufacturers appear to naturally like it. However, because polyester is a synthetic substance composed of plastic, it requires a lot of energy. As a result, it is wrinkle-free and lasts longer. It may not need to be discarded as swiftly as a cotton shirt. However, depending on the cloth it’s integrated with, it might take anywhere from 20 to 200 years to degrade.
Cotton cultivation, on the other hand, is troublesome. It sips water. Irrigated cotton fields produce more than 70% of the world’s cotton. To grow the crop, you must reroute the surface or groundwater. And this, in turn, causes its own set of issues.
How does this dilemma lead to businesses facilitating the reverse of nature loss, you ask?
Steps Ahead
What if brands don’t always start from scratch? Perhaps they turn towards the more positive outcomes of recycling.
Zara, the fast fashion behemoth, has put this into action. It debuted its new recycled fabric collection a few months ago. They’ve released a line of clothing that contains up to 50% recycled fiber. This is significant since each tonne of recycled polyester saves about 11,000 kWh of energy, which is equivalent to two years of normal home energy consumption.
Gucci’s new scent is another intriguing example. This high-end fashion firm uses alcohol generated from collected carbon emissions. They determined that ethanol is not the greatest option because it is a sugarcane product.
In addition, extensive deforestation has occurred in portions of Brazil to make room for sugarcane. Simply capture and transform the carbon instead.
However, this is not the only technique to reduce resource consumption. Since it’s not just about how brands manufacture their goods, but also about how you and I maintain them.
Textiles, in the form of synthetic microfibres, are responsible for more than a third of the microplastic contamination in the oceans. However, using a washing machine to its full capacity and choosing shorter wash cycles and lower temperatures can reduce microfibre shedding by up to 30%. When businesses invest in consumer education and awareness, it all adds up to help everyone lessen their environmental footprint.
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When brands use reverse logistics, such as recycling and take-back programs, approximately half of the yearly plastic garbage may be diverted from the ocean. Even if only ten to twenty percent of the packaging is reused. Take, for example, The Body Shop. If you purchase a product from them, you may always return the empty containers to one of their nearby stores.
Conclusion
If the fashion and personal care industries decide to source responsibly, minimize water dependence, educate customers, and implement circularity, they may make a significant difference. Unfortunately, just 5% of Fortune Global 500 firms set biodiversity loss targets.
So perhaps it’s about time to engage in a little more about being “nature positive” in the worlds of fashion and personal care. Otherwise, with the rate at which human consumerism is increasing, it may be too late to save the earth.
