Material for 2.5 billion pairs of shoes going to waste every year
Twenty-six leather industry bodies have signed an updated version of the manifesto that the industry published in October 2021 to coincide with the United Nations Climate Change Conference.
This year’s conference, COP27, is taking place in Sharm El Sheikh, Egypt, from November 6-18.
In the updated text, the signatories renew their call for recognition of the “vital role” that natural materials, including leather, play in addressing the challenges of climate change.
It says that fossil fuel-based synthetic materials cause harm and that the use of leather can help limit that harm. The leather supply chain respects the role of livestock in regenerating soil, prevents a renewable, unavoidable by-product from livestock production from going to waste, the manifesto explains.
Most of the world’s leather is made responsibly and does not harm the planet, it continues, and when leather reaches the end of its life, it can be safely returned to the soil as compost.It does not create micro-plastics or linger for millennia in landfill.
The manifesto goes on to say that, every year, an estimated 120 million hides are thrown into landfill, creating nearly 15 million tonnes of CO2 emissions. It estimates that it would be possible for tanners to produce approximately 600 million square-metres of finished leather from those hides, which would be enough “to put shoes on more than 2.5 billion pairs of feet, one-third of the world’s population.”
Furthermore, this wasted opportunity to make and use leather leads to an increase in the use of fossil fuel-derived synthetic alternatives, with the additional emissions and impacts this entails, the text points out.
The signatories, who include the International Council of Hides, Skins and Leather Traders Association (ICHSLTA), International Council of Tanners (ICT) and the International Union of Leather Technologists and Chemists Societies (IULTCS), go on to urge those taking part in COP27 to recognise the circular nature of natural fibres and their potential for a positive contribution towards reducing the climate impacts of consumer products.
They say COP27 participants should encourage the use of natural fibres wherever feasible and reduce unnecessary reliance on fossil-based materials. Those taking part in the conference should promote slow fashion, they say, which requires products that last for years, can be repaired and refurbished and used many times.
Image: Deichmann
