Harmonisierung von Standards für eine "nachhaltige Lederindustrie"

The United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 12 is to “ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns”. This comprises, among other things, sustainable management and efficient use of natural resources as well as the safe use of chemical substances throughout their entire life cycle – by the year 2020 (see UN "Agenda 2030"). To tackle these challenges, countries and regions around the globe have put different legislations in place and implementation capacities. In some regions, the EU in particular, one can observe quite dynamic legislative developments. The conditions under which leather and leather products are manufactured on a global scale can therefore differ significantly. Emerging policies as well as consumers and NGOs therefore emphasise the responsibility of businesses to ensure due diligence of environmental and social impacts along the entire supply chains.

With a view to harmonising production conditions across national borders, industry initiatives are developing standards e.g. for chemicals management in the supply chain or auditing procedures. The impact of these initiatives to date has however been limited. By not including key criteria (e.g. on social aspects), standards often lag behind legal or societal progress. Besides, while overlaps in the standards appear to be inevitable, the respective approach and criteria are however inconsistent. This in turn also hampers the smooth passing of “handover points” (e.g. when a product or process completed the scope of one standard and now enters into the scope of another). Inconsistencies lead to inefficient implementation and create complexities on the part of suppliers along the chains and their professional customers (brands, retailers). The costs for these actors to endorse the standards and comply with them are therefore high, while the benefits remain below the full potential possible due to lack of ambition. In addition, consumers are struggling even more with these complexities and this is one of the reasons why they cannot properly take these standards into account in their consumption behaviour.