Statistics have just been announced that the sale of battery farm chickens have slumped since Hugh Fernley Whittingstall’s ‘Chicken Out’ campaign to stop people buying battery farmed chicken from supermarkets was launched at the beginning of this year. The campaign gripped the nation and has subsequently encouraged us to buy free range chicken instead of birds who have only been reared inside in cramped conditions. The report states there has been a 35% increase in sales in free range chicken compared to January 2007, with the sale of indoor birds falling by 7%; Source: TSNS

Hemp, long known as a sustainable, practical fabric for the production of eco-textiles featured at the recent Earth Pledge FutureFashion show in New York where two dozen internationally-recognized designers displayed their latest creations.
Designers included Donatella Versace, Behnaz Sarafpour, Ralph Lauren, Donna Karan International, Isabel Toledo, Doo.Ri and Calvin Klein to name but a few.
Calvin Klein and Donatella Versace used hemp fabrics in some of their designs at the show, which were displayed in the windows of Barneys New York at its flagship store on Madison Avenue.
The Hemp Industries Association estimates that the North American retail market for hemp textiles and fabrics exceeded US$100 million in 2007 and is growing around 10% per year, about the same rate as the general hemp market.

Marks and Spencer has announced that they are adding 5p per carrier bag for all food shoppers in a bid to reduce the amount of plastic bags they give away.  13bn plastic bags are given away free to UK shoppers every year and they take an estimated 1000 years to decay.M&S carried out a trial of the 5p charge at 50 of its Northern Ireland and South West of England stores which resulted in the demand for polythene bags falling by more than 70%.  The charge had a positive effect and will be implemented in all of the chains stores.  On top of this the money raised from the 5p charge will be going to their partner charity, Groundwork www.groundwork.org.uk 

There has been a huge surge in popularity as sales for fairtrade products hits almost £500m.  Twice as many much was sold in 2007 as the previous year, rising in value by 81 per cent – double the trend for the past decade.  Overall, the value of Fairtrade goods shot up from £273m to £493m, far exceeding the 49 per cent rise recorded the previous year.

The statistics being drawn and the behaviour of retailers (Tesco ban cotton from Uzbekistan) suggest that Fairtrade is becoming “mainstreamed”.

Source: The Independent

Fairtrade Fortnight starts this week and is one of the biggest campaigns of the year for the Fairtrade Foundation encouraging people to buy fairtrade products wherever possible.  There are numerous events up and down the country to promote the campaign which are open to all, to find out more visit www.fairtrade.org.uk

“Chemical farming is portrayed as a great triumph of western technology because it produces mountains of grain and tanker loads of milk. But who can take pride in a system that destroys the Earth’s most precious asset - its soil?”Graham Harvey, The Ecologist, March 2008

Unilever has the best corporate responsibility reputation among companies across all sectors, according to the third annual covalence ethical reputation ranking. A company’s score is based on the number of positive news stories about it relative to negative coverage. The rest of the top ten, in order, are Toyota, HSBC, Hewlett-Packard, Alcoa, Starbucks, Rio Tinto, Intel, Dell and Marks & Spencer.

Source: www.ethicalcorp.com 

The climate change debate has shifted from whether we need to act to what we must do and how best to do it.  The Climate Change Summit that took place this week (12^th-13^th February) focused on this very question.

The Climate Change Summit 2008 aim is to highlight ways in which we can learn about how to prepare for the enormous changes that lie ahead and discover how to make a virtue out of necessity.

Speakers at the event included Defra, M&S, Timberland, British Gas, The Carbon Trust, PepsiCo, Tesco, IBM, Continental Clothing Company, WWF UK to name but a few. 

The key topics focused on where climate initiatives that achieve both environmental and business objectives, crafting climate change messages that win over the most skeptical consumers, an A-Z of using offsets and taking advantage of carbon trading, how to report on your climate change objectives, achievements for maximum impact and how to manage the many risks of climate change.

To find out more about this event and feedback from the summit please log onto http://www.ethicalcorp.com/climate/

This week has been all about fashion in London – and an encouraging announcement by The Environmental Justice Foundation reporting that ethical fashion is increasing.  To celebrate this twenty top models, including Irina Lazarean, Coco Rocha, Catherine McNeil, CarolineTrentini, Siri Tollerod and Behati Prinsloo, have put their names to the latest EJF campaign, whose aim is to eradicate child labour and harmful chemicals in cotton production.

Four designers including, Luella Bartley, Christian Lacroix, Betty Jackson and Katharine Hamnett have designed a range of eco chic t-shirts around the theme of childhood to put focus on the millions of children forced to work in the cotton industry.

The prints are typical to the four designers and they look great on the 20 models, who sport them in photos that are on show at Estethica at London Fashion Week and on EJF’s website. 

In a speech to the European Parliament, Prince Charles has described the fight against global climate change as a war with the Doomsday Clock “ticking ever closer to midnight”.

Stating that a determined and principled leadership has never been more needed and that the corporate world was often ahead of many politicians in the debate on climate change.  He believes that only a coalition of the public and private sectors and non-governmental organisations could find an effective solution.