NEW DELHI: On Wednesday, January 12, Aditya Birla Fashion and Retail Limited (ABFRL) announced a collaboration with the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH to improve sustainable practices in the apparel and textile industries. The collaboration is being carried, on behalf of the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development.
According to the announcement, the joint project is intended to introduce material innovation, reduce harmful substance inputs, increase textile-to-textile recycling, develop alternatives to plastic packaging, and foster traceability. The programme will supplement existing business practices such as down cycling, recycling, reusing, and introducing new sustainable production processes. With GIZ assistance, ABFRL and Indian industry players will be able to leverage circular business practices and implement complex processes that are both technically superior and consumer-friendly.
Ashish Dikshit, Managing Director, ABFRL stated that existing practices must be “self-disrupted” in order to transition to a more circular approach. Promoting common understanding is thus critical for the entire textile sector in India’s long-term development. The collaboration seeks to raise awareness among key stakeholders in order to promote circular approaches, reduce waste, and create closed-loop systems. Dieter Frick, Project Manager, GIZ Germany, said that ABFRL and GIZ have developed a concept and will pool their capacities for three years under this funding programme to find and implement circular business approaches to strengthen a sustainable Indian textile and apparel industry in collaboration with other sector partners.