Sustainable Leather Foundation: The goal is to lift the entire tanning industry, from grass roots to blue chip, into a sustainable model

The best known of these are The Leather Working Group and Leather Naturally.

The Sustainable Leather Foundation (SLF) is the newest of these organisations, founded a year ago and headed by MD Deborah Taylor, who previously headed the Leather Working Group, and technical director Karl Flowers. Among its other directors is outspoken commentator Ralph Arbeid, who is non-executive director - operations.

 

The Sustainable Leather Foundation (SLF), which describes itself as "completely independent - self-funded and self-created", is seeking tannery partners globally, and its second and third African members, Zimbabwean tanneries Global Tanners and Zambezi Tanners, joined in August. Moroccan tannery Sicontact Company Leather Factory is also a member, along with a number of European tanneries and a tannery in India.

“During my 5 years managing the Leather Working Group, I listened to tanneries, brands and suppliers when they talked about their challenges and what was needed in the industry to support them," says SLF MD Deborah Taylor.  "While it was clear that LWG was covering a lot of the environmental bases, it still left gaps in social responsibility and governance issues.  It was also difficult for companies to understand what they needed to do and how they could start to progress if they weren’t able to meet the demands of the LWG protocol.  That was the starting point for SLF, creating a system that was fully inclusive, accessible and modular so that it leaves no-one behind and encourages whole industry improvement from grass roots to blue chip.”

In addition to the Moroccan and Zimbabwean tanneries, she said Prof. Mwinyikione Mwinyihija, executive director of the Africa Leather & Leather Products Institute (ALLPI), who joined SLF's Advisory Board in December, had confirmed ALLPI’s intention to join SLF as an official associate member partner, "but unfortunately he then fell ill and we haven’t established a replacement Advisory Board member yet".

She said she had intended to visit South African tanneries on her way to Ethiopia to speak at the World Leather Congress in November, "but unfortunately, all these plans are now a little uncertain due to the continuing Covid situation. But I do hope to encourage more African countries to begin to consider how they can more visibly become part of the global leather marketplace."

In a release on 27 August, she described SLF's progress thus far:

 

The Foundation is just a year old and so we have been getting our tools and dashboard in place and are now actively working to encourage partners to participate.  So far we have 11 tanneries already mapped on the dashboard:

3 Tanneries from Italy

1 Tannery from India 

1 Tannery from Germany

2 Tanneries from Zimbabwe

1 Tannery from Morocco

3 Tanneries from Brazil

And 2 more are in the process of joining from Bangladesh

 

So we are seeing traction from across the globe now and a mix of current performance - some tanneries have a lot of certification already, others have none at all which is exactly what we want to emphasise – that you don’t need to pass an audit to start to work on these areas but we will support you in them.

Recognition of Sustainable Leather Foundation as an organisation that is committed to supporting the leather industry globally gains momentum this month as two tanneries from Zimbabwe become partners.

Deborah Taylor, Managing Director, commented “we are delighted to welcome both Global Tanners (Pvt) Ltd and Zambezi Tanners into partnership of the Foundation and are looking forward to working with them to identify their priorities for improvement based on their geographic and operational concerns.

For a long time there has been a disconnect between the leather manufacturing facilities working in the top 20% of the industry and the vast majority of large producing leather manufacturers that have not had access to the same level of support and opportunity.  One of the Foundation’s key objectives is to find ways of connecting the two ends of the industry to raise standards, reducing negative impacts and increasing positive impacts in the most sustainable way possible.”

Clement Shoko of Global Tanners (Pvt) Ltd and Chair of the Zimbabwe Leather Development Council agrees “we are leading the way for Zimbabwe in understanding that by adopting the Sustainable Leather Foundation’s modular approach we can all benefit from a fully supportive mechanism.  We look forward to working with SLF to develop workshops and training materials that are relevant for our region and that demonstrate our work globally”.

Arnold Britten from Zambezi Tanners added “we have for some time now understood the need to demonstrate our improvement measures and to create access to markets but until now we were not able to make use of the existing platforms.  With SLF, our ability to now engage in a meaningful way is possible and we are looking forward to seeing how far we can develop with the support of the Foundation”. 

SLF’s Transparency Dashboard™ and modular, inclusive approach alleviates duplication of effort, allowing companies to work at their own pace and encourages all tiers within the leather value chain to work together to create strong partnerships for the future.

 

 

  

With both Global Tanners and Zambezi Tanners joining the SLF, it is hoped that this is a first step and practical example for others in the region and beyond to follow. 

The Sustainable Leather Foundation was created to address the following:

With a rising recognition of the need to address sustainability risks that include environmental, social and governance concerns, there was no existing organisation that was addressing all these elements collectively and comprehensively.  

Industry was becoming jaded by the increasing need to duplicate effort and resource in order to meet the demands of different value chain partners or different standards.  

There was no efficient or effective method of externalising the work being done inside the industry with consumers who, in recent years, have been subjected to a vast amount of conflicting, misleading or confusing messages.

Work inside the industry was too heavily focused on the distinguishing factors of those tanneries in the top 20% and not enough was being done to support the other 80% of tanneries around the world.

 

The keystone of SLF’s solution for the industry is our SLF Transparency Dashboard™.  This innovative tool provides a way of addressing all of the above areas in a clear, accessible and inclusive way. By giving visibility to the areas of risk to be addressed within each of the ESG modules, the Dashboard offers an easy visual of where a value chain compliance partner currently is, in terms of meeting industry standards of risk assessment and performance.  Some organisations will be right at the start of their journey and their Dashboard will reflect that, other organisations will be able to meet all the requirements and their Dashboard will reflect that for them.  This is achieved using a simple traffic light system of progress (see figure 1).   

This gives the mechanism for displaying information in a way that is consistent and transparent and allows organisations to participate irrespective of how many module components are already assessed. 

The information shown in Figure 1 is open-source and accessible to all.  However, the added layer of transparency as shown in Figure 2 below is available exclusively for Partners of SLF, and this additional information will enhance the ability of brands and retailers to have a full understanding of their value chain suppliers, enabling metrics and other data to be understood.  This provides the ability to make claims and also to work more closely to support value chain partners for any areas of improvement or concern.

 

 

As part of the drive to reduce duplication of effort, if an organisation already holds certification from other verification bodies, then that certification can be mapped directly onto the dashboard. There is no need to re-audit as long as the minimum standard is reached through the alternative certification company.  Underpinning all of this, is SLF’s own certification programme and suite of technical documents that covers all 3 areas of ESG and can be used to either complete the oustanding sustainability gaps, or can be adopted to perform the full audit scope, depending on the need of the individual organisation.  This modular approach means that companies work according to their need and their capability.  

 

The suite of tools comprises:

 

 

The final benefit of the SLF approach is that it allows SLF to engage in a credible way with consumers.  Through the use of QR codes and POS materials, consumers can be directed to appropriate, verifiable information that is factual, clear and relevant.  Consumers do not need the full Dashboard metrics, but they do need the data to be translated into information that instils trust in the purchasing decisions they make.

The SLF Transparency Dashboard™ coupled with the Technical Suite of Tools and QR enabled messaging are just some of the ways that the Sustainable Leather Foundation is working to support the leather value chain.  

To learn more about the Foundation’s work please contact: Deborah@sustainableleatherfoundation.com or visit the website:  www.sustainableleatherfoundation.com