{"id":13200,"date":"2011-08-05T09:54:05","date_gmt":"2011-08-05T15:54:05","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.sustainablog.org\/?p=13200"},"modified":"2011-08-05T09:54:05","modified_gmt":"2011-08-05T15:54:05","slug":"greenpeace-clothing-campaign","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sustainablog.org\/articles\/greenpeace-clothing-campaign\/","title":{"rendered":"Greenpeace Clothing Campaign Calls Out Nike, Adidas, Puma and Others for Their Toxic Ways"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Greenpeace Detox Now! striptease in Frankfurt, Germany<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Are you aware that the textile industry is one of the top users and polluters of water? Fiber for one cotton t-shirt requires 713 gallons of water. And traditional wet-dye methods use from seven to 75 gallons of water per pound of fabric. All this adds up to trillions of gallons of water each year passing through textile factories\u2013and that\u2019s just for dyeing.<\/p>\n

Greenpeace has been alarmed by not just the amount of water used to make our clothing, but they have proven that the water leaves the factories polluted with heavy metals and toxic chemicals that cause serious health problems to animals and people.<\/p>\n

In a report released last month, Greenpeace released the details of a year-long Dirty Laundry investigation<\/a> examining the practices of two of China\u2019s major textile dye factories. To gather the information, Greenpeace campaigners, often in protective suits collected water samples from outside the factories that were carefully analyzed. The results clearly show that toxins are spilling into China\u2019s rivers<\/a> on a daily basis.<\/p>\n

One of the researchers, Zhong Yu, even reported that one time when she feel in the muck around a discharge pipe, she lost her shoe and her foot was submerged in the waste-water seepage. As she says in a blog post<\/a> on Greenpeace\u2019s website, “That night, my foot began to itch like mad. It turned red, and the next day, erupted in red spots. Eventually my skin started peeling, layer by layer<\/strong>.” It’s been over a month and her foot is still in bad shape.<\/p>\n

According to Greenpeace, the discharge from these factories<\/a> includes heavy metals and “hazardous and persistent chemicals with hormone-disrupting properties were found being discharged from these facilities. Alkylphenols (including nonylphenol) were found in wastewater samples from both factories, and perfluorinated chemicals (PFCs) were present in the wastewater from the Youngor Textile Complex.”<\/p>\n

Surprise! You\u2019re Wearing Toxic Clothes<\/h3>\n

During the course of the year, Greenpeace found that brands we all buy are linked to the two manufacturers. The brands include: Abercrombie & Fitch, Adidas, Bauer Hockey, Calvin Klein, Converse, Cortefiel, Gap, H&M, Lacoste, Nike, Phillips-Van Heusen Corporation (PVH Corp) and Puma.<\/p>\n

Most of these international brands have denied using the dye services at either of the two factories, saying that they\u2019re only \u201ccut and sew\u201d customers for these locations. But the fact remains that these two factories are typical of what you\u2019ll find all over China and anywhere else wet-dyeing is done.<\/p>\n

Some of these companies have been working on improving their sustainability efforts and reducing the environmental footprint of their products. But their plans didn\u2019t include a goal to eliminate toxic dyes.<\/p>\n

Of course, Greenpeace\u2019s report is not the end of the story. They have launched the Detox Now! campaign<\/a> to pressure Nike, Adidas and others to publically commit to eliminating the release of hazardous chemicals from their products entire lifecycle.<\/p>\n

People around the world are responding. Thousands have signed an online petition and 600 folks in ten countries showed up outside Nike and Adidas stores and did a striptease on July 23.<\/p>\n