Chain of Custody Traceability

On 8 December 2021, Ecotextile News published “Better Cotton plans €25m traceability system”, speaking to Alia Malik, Senior Director of Data and Traceability, and Josh Taylor, Senior Traceability Coordinator, about our collaboration across the sector and long-term plans for developing full physical traceability in the cotton supply chain.

Innovating towards full physical traceability

While we are learning from traceability solutions that exist, we also understand that achieving full physical traceability is a hugely ambitious, very complex piece of work that will require new approaches to suit the needs along the cotton supply chain. We have estimated that the project will require €25 million in funding over four years and launch by the end of 2023 to supplement the current mass balance system.

Better Cotton will launch a digital traceability platform. So we’re going to go for the great big innovation now.

Alia Malik, Better Cotton, Senior Director of Data and Traceability

Collaborating across the sector

Better Cotton has been working closely with a panel of retailers and brands since last year to understand how we may deliver traceability in a way most meaningful for our members and to facilitate the inclusion of producers in increasingly regulated international value chains by connecting the supply chain through traceability. We understand that continued collaboration will be essential to inspire, influence and learn from our partnerships.

ISEAL are very interested in this because, with the changing regulatory landscape, a lot of different standard systems outside of apparel, as well as in it, are looking at what tweaks they need to make to support better traceability. So it’s something that we have the opportunity to lead and to help shape for the sector.

Read the full Ecotextile News article, “Better Cotton plans €25m traceability system”.

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