text: UN climate report's fashion takeaways: Time for nature-based solutions | Vogue Business
  UN climate report's fashion takeaways: Time for nature-based solutions
  Nature-based solutions are key to a viable future, according to the newest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change as it urges industries to accelerate efforts and investments.
  Joaquin Meabe/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
  Adapting to a changing climate and reducing greenhouse gas emissions through nature-based approaches in particular should be the top global priorities for fighting climate change and building a more sustainable future, according to the latest UN climate report.
  The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has been urging governments and industries, including fashion, to reduce emissions to slow the rise in global temperatures.
  The latest report, following the first instalment published in August, says governments must ramp up efforts not only to mitigate but also adapt to the changing climate. In addition to replacing fossil fuels with renewable energy, it urges policymakers and industries to reduce emissions through nature-based climate solutions — protecting or restoring ecosystems that naturally sequester carbon — and to be inclusive and equitable in how they implement them.
  Given the depth and breadth of its operations around the globe, fashion is in the rare position of being able to address and elevate all of these priorities at once.
  "We need to remodel the way things are grown and produced anyway, because the current model doesn't work anymore — so, why don't we go back and set the system up, fundamentally, from the perspective of how it should be? That starts with a rights-based approach," says Urs Dieterich, manager of the land use fund at South Pole, a consultancy that works with companies in the fashion sector and others to reduce supply chain emissions.
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  Businesses, he says, face "one of these pivotal moments in time" where they're able to push the systems-wide change that's necessary for the challenges at hand. "It starts with the farmers in countries in the Global South, Indigenous communities, women, and then it goes all the way down the supply chain, closer and closer to the corporate headquarters. I think the smartest corporate leaders out there will make the right choices to shape [the industry] in a fundamentally better way."
  The IPCC report, the second of three, has drawn attention from global policymakers, scientists and climate advocates around the world, both because of the urgency of the message from climate researchers and because of the window of opportunity it outlines to invest in adaptation for a more livable future. What also stood out for experts is the report's discussion of social inequality as inseparable from climate change; and its recognition, unprecedented for such a high-level report, of Indigenous peoples' rights and the ecological knowledge they've developed over time. The report highlights this is crucial to not only benefiting communities most vulnerable to climate change but to also increase the effectiveness of efforts to address the crisis on a global scale.
  Industry leaders say fashion's sustainability efforts have matured, with executives promising to devote their energy in 2022 to reducing supply chain or Scope 3 emissions; scaling innovation; improving end-of-life management for products; and transforming agriculture. The industry's push for regenerative agriculture, when implemented correctly, can fit well into the nature-based climate approach that this report so clearly calls for. The key takeaway for brands, experts say, is that they need to accelerate and expand those efforts and work with local communities, suppliers and others to ensure they are implemented in an effective and holistic manner.
  "Looking at nature as a guidance — most nature-based solutions address multiple problems. It's not a silo," says Dieterich.
  Fashion's agricultural supply chain is an obvious place to start. "Farming is the only aspect of the fashion supply chain which functions on crazily varying and unpredictable factors like weather, pest, water, soil conditions," says Nishanth Chopra, founder of Oshadi, a London-based brand that operates its own cotton farm in India, yet it is consistently overlooked by the industry. "All other processes like spinning, weaving and sewing can be monitored and channelled to the most extent. Therefore it's obvious that investing in and working with farms and farmers should be the first and foremost focus to initiate any change."
  The approach has gained traction in fashion as brands from Eileen Fisher to Reformation attempt to establish direct links with farmers, while other companies are exploring more experimental models. Kering, for example, launched a fund to invest in farmers transitioning their agricultural practices and California label Christy Dawn debuted a farm-to-closet programme last year (with Oshadi as its farming partner) inviting customers to invest directly in the farmers themselves.
  London brand Oshadi operates a farm in India that uses regenerative practices.
  There's room to apply the nature-based approach elsewhere in the supply chain. Reducing the amount of water and harmful chemicals used in manufacturing, for example, can go a long way to mitigating the impacts on local ecosystems. And while the industry urgently needs to replace fossil fuels in the supply chain with renewable energy, efforts to decarbonise also have to involve eliminating petroleum-based chemicals and materials, such as polyester, which critics say add to the industry's dependence on fossil fuels.
  "The big question after seeing this IPCC report is: will brands shift to the right solutions or continue to seek false promises?" says Muhannad Malas, senior climate campaigner for fashion at the advocacy group Stand.Earth. He says the industry has relied too heavily on partial fixes, such as switching from coal to natural gas or biomass and choosing recycled polyester or other materials that have a lower footprint than their conventional counterparts but still have "high ecological impacts".
  As consequential as these decisions are, a more profound change for many brands might be in how they devise their sustainability strategies in the first place.
  The report makes clear that marginalised communities have been overlooked, around the world, to the detriment of both the communities and the planet as a whole: "Indigenous knowledge contains unique information sources about past changes and potential solutions to present issues," the authors write in a technical summary. "Nature-based activities, endemic knowledge and unique insights about plants and animals are being lost. As 80 per cent of the world's remaining biodiversity is on Indigenous homelands, these losses have cascading impacts on cultural and linguistic diversity and Indigenous knowledge systems, food security, health, and livelihoods, often with irreparable damages and consequences."
  Strengthening relationships throughout the supply chain is the only way to push sustainability in an equitable way, advocates and suppliers say.
  "It's about treating others the way you treat yourself in the simplest form. 'Others' need not necessarily only be other humans, but others can be the ecosystem we live in with millions of animals, organisms, plants and trees that surround us," says Oshadi's Chopra. "Each supply chain has its own nuances. It's really understanding our supply chain from the ground up."
  At its core, the crisis is as much a moral one as it is about health, the environment or economics, says Dieterich.
  "It's just profound. Let's just stop and think: we have these communities least responsible for climate change and they're facing the greatest threats. They're facing increased floods and droughts and storms and increased temperatures, and solutions should centre these most vulnerable groups," he says. "It'll make the world a better place as well if we just do that."
  latestsustainabilityUnited Nationsclimate changecarbon emissionssupply chainregenerative agriculturebiodiversitycottonKeringReformationEileen Fishergreen sciencefarmingpoliticsmaterials