RESPONSIBLE COTTON & EQUALITY

In today's sustainability-focused landscape, adapting and developing robust company strategies is crucial to managing legal pressures and legislation affecting supply chains. Artistic milliners shares its cotton and equality programs guided by environmental social governance criteria established to lead their responsible journey.

The core of Artistic Milliners’ strategy is supported by a multi-pillar framework, with each pillar crafted to address specific environmental or social concerns inside the company, but also within their cultural circle of influence among their workers where their facilities are located. There are seven primary pillars in the company's strategy: Climate Change and Decarbonization, Energy Transition & Efficiency, Water Stewardship, Circularity & Zero Waste, Sustainable Materials, Green Chemistry, and Biodiversity.

Responsible Cotton Sourcing

Artistic Milliners' Cotton journey began in 2019 with the inception of the Milliner Cotton Initiative (MCI), a cotton program covering the entire journey of cotton from farm to the mill, with the goal of providing farm families and local women with training and alternative livelihoods. The initiative also leverages smart farming and climate-conscious practices, which reduce inputs such as fertilizer, pesticides, and water, and increase yields. The program highlights and empowers the farmers and communities that are often overlooked.

The program is currently expanding to include a Regenagri certified regenerative agricultural component, and, next year, will also include Milliner Organic, promoting local ownership for ethical cotton sourcing in Pakistan. The main goal is to highlight and empower farmers and communities and is accredited by Control Union and Organic Cotton Accelerator (OCA) to ensure farming methods comply with global organic standards.

To guarantee complete traceability and transparency from farm to garment, the denim mill was developed in partnership with the platform Retraced, a blockchain-enabled farm-to-fashion traceability app. Another tool related to data measurement is the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA), conceived in collaboration with Peterson to help assess environmental impacts.

Equality in the Supply Chain

In Pakistan, women represent 49.2% of the population, but only 24.6% of the business sector. The primary challenge lies within the cultural context, with these limitations not only affecting the workforce and society but also exerting a quantifiable economic impact. This impact is reflected in their GDP (Gross Domestic Product), which decreases by 30 billion dollars to 35 billion dollars.

Saqib Sohail, Head of Responsible Business Projects at Artistic Milliners, stated: “How can we influence change in this culture? We provide women with equal opportunities and build safe spaces for them. That's been our plan for years, and the results speak for themselves: Since 2014, our female workforce has multiplied by three, that's more than 6,000 women. The number of women in leadership roles has grown by a factor of five, which represents 50% of our top management. We’ve proven we can do it. Nothing changes mindsets as much as results. The challenge is to do it consistently.”