There’s a fine line when it comes to deeming a fiber “sustainable” — especially when it’s cotton. But a handful of domestic cotton producers are already farming responsibly, and view the emergence of sustainability as an opportunity for vast and impactful improvement throughout the cotton industry. To achieve that end, the National Cotton Council created a pilot of the U.S. Cotton Trust Protocol, a new program developed to help the U.S. cotton production sector continue reducing its footprint by allowing producers to track their progress against specific sustainability goals — and to increase awareness of domestic cotton producers that are already doing it right. A pilot of the program was initiated earlier this year, and full implementation is scheduled for 2020.
Companies such as Applied DNA, a molecular technology provider, support the need for accountability — and said terms such as “eco-friendly,” “natural,” “green” and “organic” are vague labels that can confuse and mislead consumers. To tackle that, the firm will collaborate with Reliance Industries Ltd. — an Indian-based firm that began in textiles and polyester, and now touts an integrated portfolio of products and services from energy to entertainment — to develop and commercialize apparel made from RIL’s R Elan GreenGold fabric and Recron GreenGold recycled polyester and fiber and filament, powered by Applied DNA’s CertainT platform, which allows raw materials and products to be tagged with a unique molecular identifier.
