Supply Chain and Supplier List

 

Strong, long-term relations with our suppliers is one of our top priorities as a brand. Our suppliers make the Weekday designs come to life, and we're proud to create our products in close collaboration with such skilled manufactures.

We want our relationship with our suppliers to be based on mutual trust as well as transparency. Our suppliers are listed on our website, by each product. In this way, our customers can easily access information about who makes our clothes.

More in-depth information on our suppliers is found here. Our supplier list shares the details of our tier 1 suppliers and the manufacturing and processing factories they work with, together accounting for 100% of the products we sell.

 

 

Climate impact 

 

We’re committed to set a net-zero target and the Paris Agreement gives us a clear goal to limit global temperature rise to 1.5°C. The Science Based Targets Initiative’s (SBTi) Net-Zero Standard helps companies like ours translate this global goal into corporate targets. In September 2022, the SBTi verified the H&M group goals: Reducing our absolute emissions by 56% by 2030 and achieve net-zero by 2040. But we're never static, we will change again to realign with new science.

 

We constantly work on finding ways to reduce our greenhouse emissions. These include:

• Low impact recycled and sustainably sourced materials.
  
• Freight methods that lead to the least carbon dioxide emissions.
• Working with our suppliers to reduce energy use in production. 

 

Plastic

 

We are taking steps to eliminate problematic and unnecessary plastic from our productions.

• We do not use PVC.
• By 2025 we will eliminate problematic or unnecessary plastic packaging.
• By 2025 100% of our plastic packaging will be reusable, recyclable, or compostable.

We are committed to reduce and improve our packaging materials. As a part of H&M Group we have signed a global commitment about plastic waste and pollution with the New Plastic Economy Global Commitment to speed up the shift towards 100% circular packaging. By 2025 we will have eliminated problematic or unnecessary plastic packaging and move from single use to reuse models. We want 100% of plastic packaging to be reusable, recyclable, or compostable.

 

 

Water

 

Water scarcity and quality are significant global issues: two billion people live in countries experiencing high water stress, and 80% of wastewater flows back into ecosystems without being treated in the world. In our supply chain 100% of the wastewater is going through Effluent Water Treatment.

 

Our industry and business need water, but we use too much. Clean water is a basic human right and essential for thriving biodiversity. It’s our responsibility to conserve water, reuse and recycle wherever possible and keep it clean for future generations.

 

Some of the things we do to limit our impact:

• Constantly increase our share of recycled materials, which require less water than virgin materials.
• To ensure we do the right thing in the right place, we perform water risk assessment using WWF´s water risk filter.
• Recycling production water (21 % in 2021 throughout H&M Group).
• Implementing rainwater harvesting systems (41% of facilities in H&M Group supply chain have implemented these systems). 

 

Carbon pricing 

Another important step towards H&M Group’s 2040 goal of reaching net-zero was the development of an internal carbon pricing model and tool. Internal carbon pricing will help to quantify costs for the emissions from the different decisions taken by the group – for instance when designing, producing, and selling a product. By directly connecting emissions to a price on carbon, product developers at H&M Group can make more informed decisions when choosing where to produce an item or what material to use. Working with this tool will raise company-wide awareness of the cost of carbon, and the funds will be invested in various climate initiatives and projects to reduce future CO2 emissions in the supply chain. It will also support the transition towards more sustainable materials.

 

Chemicals

 

Progressive chemical management is an essential part of circular fashion. Our Chemical Management Roadmap commits us to zero discharge, 100% traceability and 100% toxic-free fashion.

We work with a very strict chemical restriction list, which is at a minimum always based on the highest legal standard in any of our sales countries, as well as on information from authorities, NGOs and scientific reports.

 

Some of our guidelines:

• We do not use PVC.
• We restrict formaldehyde, antibacterial substances, nonylphenol ethoxylates and several AZO and disperse dyes.
• We do not use heavy metals, such as cadmium, lead and mercury.
• Zero Discharge — no discharge of prioritised hazardous chemicals in the supply chain.
• We oblige all our suppliers to comply with our chemical restrictions list.

 

Transparency

 

We believe that a responsible brand should aim to be as transparent as possible, sharing information on where and how products are made. Products are an outcome of a production chain built on strong relationships with our skilled manufacturers, that all meet our environmental and social standards. You can find supplier information on each product page online.

 

Transparency contributes to meaningful change in two important ways:

• Empowering informed choice.
• Accelerating sustainable change in our business and industry.

 

Comparing sustainability performance 

We also believe in industry-wide collaboration tools that promote transparency. Therefore, we will start to use the Sustainable Apparel Coalition’s Higg Index, a suite of assessment tools enabling brands, retailers, and individual facilities to accurately measure, score and compare sustainability performance. These scores will help compare sustainability performance across the industry. 

 

Policy Documents