Ever wondered how your favourite fashion brand does when it comes to being upfront about disclosing information on its climate friendliness? A report titled ‘What Fuels Fashion’, put out by the global not-for-profit Fashion Revolution, has ranked 200 of the world’s largest fashion brands, including Ajio, Max, and Reliance Trends, to conclude that the average disclosure is just 14 per cent.
The report measures scores for brands across multiple categories related to transparency, climate action, and supply chain sustainability, with a detailed methodology emphasising measurable impacts. Of these categories, decarbonisation carries the greatest weight (41%), followed by accountability, financing decarbonisation, energy procurement, and just transition advocacy.
Decarbonisation covers targets aligned with reducing emissions, phasing out the use of coal, renewable electricity, and an exclusion of accounting loopholes like carbon offsets, which do not actually result in any emission reduction.
Accountability involves supply chain transparency, disclosure of suppliers, emission hotspots, and factory-level data essential for targeted action.
Energy Procurement assesses how brands source energy in their operations and supply chains, including the use of self-generated renewables, power purchase agreements, and disclosure of procurement methods.
Financing Decarbonisation measures disclosures on investment in renewable energy infrastructure and support to suppliers for decarbonisation.
Just Transition Advocacy evaluates brands’ public commitments and advocacy for workers' rights and climate adaptation in supply chains.
Of the 39 brands that disclose no information in the public domain are Smart Bazaar, Van Heusen, Forever 21, Max Mara, Nine West, Reebok, Ted Baker, Aeropostale and Saks Fifth Avenue. The brand which does best on the scale is H&M with a score of 71 per cent. Other high rankers are Puma, Gucci, Adidas and Hanes.
Of popular Indian brands, while Smart Bazaar discloses no information, Max (Reliance) does a little better with a two percent score. Ajio is slightly above these with an overall score of five percent. Amazon’s score is 9 per cent, while the popular Shein is at 13 per cent.
On the accountability factor, Max, Ajio, and Reliance Trends draw a zero. Just as they do on decarbonisation, which means there is no way to measure if their carbon emissions have reduced from a baseline.
The report notes that the fashion industry has plateaued when it comes to disclosures on supply chains. This means there is no way of knowing whether these are built on the resources of the poor and marginalised. It is of concern that the largest chunk of these non-disclosures (59 per cent) come from publicly listed companies, which owe this information to their investors. Reliance Trends, Ajio, Smart Bazaar- all three do not put out information on where there products are made/sourced from.
The report also draws attention to one of the fashion world’s worst mistakes- overproduction. As it points out- the sector thrives on creating desire, fuelling consumption and chasing ‘endless growth’. However, as 91 per cent of the brands examined do not disclose their production volumes, they cannot be held accountable.
India also does poorly on the energy source front, with 46 per cent of the fashion industry’s energy coming from coal. This is second only to China’s share of 61 per cent.
As the report clarifies, it calculates the ranking based on publicly self-disclosed information without an independent verification of these claims. It also does not measure ethics or sustainability. Most importantly, it is not a shopping guide.