Outdoor Clothing Ethics Under Scrutiny

Greetings,

In a shocking and scathing report, the issue of environmental awareness amongst companies making outdoor and sports clothing is finally being addressed!

Many items of outdoor clothing and equipment are heavily dependent on oil based chemicals, resulting in highly polluting toxic waste.

Another concern raised in the report was of the use of nanotechnology, and the toxicity and environmental impacts of nanomaterials and their potential effects on global economics.

Tim Hunt of Ethical Consumer said, “It would be unfair to single out any one company as being the worst of the lot as they’re all as overwhelmingly poor as each other”

However, a number of companies, out of the sixty investigated, have disputed the report as inaccurate and misleading. Richard Cotter, Berghaus brand president, said the company’s ethical stance was “not accurately reflected in this report” and that they were not given a chance to respond. Also, Richard Collier, Helly Hansen vice-president said “on the occasions where the report does reflect specific Helly Hansen activity, we found the research and analysis to be incomplete and misleading.”

Simon Birch, one of the reports authors, said “from where I’m standing it’s the outdoor industry that needs to start taking its environmental responsibilities more seriously. If a company is happy enough to use a mountain in its latest catalogue to help boost its profits, then it’s about time that the same company started to help protect it – and the rest of the environment too.”

Read the report on outdoor gear and let us know what you think!

Lucille

EMERGE 3Rs

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