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German firm Messe Frankfurt to hold Fashion SDG Summit during FFW

25 Jun '21
4 min read
Pic: Messe Frankfurt
Pic: Messe Frankfurt

Messe Frankfurt, world’s largest trade fair organiser, has announced that on July 7, 2021, leading representatives of design and fashion industry, of the United Nations, of academic research and of public life will be discussing new ways of putting the sustainable development goals (SDGs) into practice in the fashion world at Frankfurt Fashion SDG Summit.
 
The summit, one of the leading conferences during Frankfurt Fashion Week (FFW), will be casting light on the urgent challenges facing the industry from a wide variety of perspectives and will be lobbying consistently in the direction of sustainability. The conference, presented by the Conscious Fashion Campaign and organised in collaboration with the United Nations Office for Partnerships, will be broadcast live and digital via the FFW Studio.
 
“The Frankfurt Fashion SDG Summit will be guided in its agenda by the priorities which UN general secretary António Guterres has enunciated for 2021, in order to reach the seventeen sustainability goals by 2030. Keynote talks, interviews, panel discussions and performances will sketch the global status of fashion and design and set out the path towards transformation in the industry, towards a policy comprising humanity, climate protection and clean oceans,” the company said in a press release.
 
“The fashion industry is responsible (depending on source) for 1.2 to 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon-dioxide emissions. This equals three to five percent of world-wide CO2 emissions – more than air and sea travel together. Thus the fashion industry is one of the biggest environmental polluters in the world,” the company added. “A panel discussion entitled “The Role of Fashion + Climate on the Road to COP26” will consider the urgent question of how the industry can contribute to the Twenty Sixth UN Climate Conference (COP 26) in November and direct its course more strongly towards sustainability.” 
 
At the climate conference in Glasgow the task will be to accelerate the measures contained in the Paris Climate Accord and the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. A primary goal of COP26 will consist of bringing world-wide CO2 emissions to zero by the middle of the century. With this in mind, the session, which will feature Caroline Rush (chief executive of the British Fashion Council) and Paloma Costa (member of the United Nations secretary general's Youth Advisory Group on Climate Change), will consider the most urgent environmental problems which must be addressed in the fashion industry. The talk will be chaired by Kerry Bannigan (founder of the Conscious Fashion Campaign).
 
A panel entitled “Promoting Resilient Oceans Through Conscious Fashion” will address the challenges and solutions at the interface of ocean protection and fashion production. Among those on the stage for the discussion will be former professional surfer and founder of the leading surf brand Starboard Svein Rasmussen, fashion designer and environmental activist Runa Ray and professor Antje Boetius of the Alfred Wegener Institute.
 
Another discussion session entitled “Sustainability by Design: Rethinking Fashion Events”, with Christiane Arp (president of the German Fashion Council), Claudio Marenzi (president of Pitti Uomo Firenze), Detlef Braun (member of the executive board of Messe Frankfurt) and Steven Kolb (president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America), will provide a look ahead towards future – sustainably designed – fashion events.
 
According to the company, on the stage at the digital version of the Frankfurt Fashion SDG Summit will be internationally leading representatives of government, research, the fashion and textile industry and NGOs, plus designers, artists and United Nations advocates. In addition to the speakers mentioned above, among others will be Abrima Erwiah (co-founder and president of Studio One Eighty Nine), Caroline Rush (chief executive of the British Fashion Council), Christiane Arp (president of the Fashion Council Germany), Clara Mayer (press speaker of Fridays for Future), Claudia Rinke (screenwriter of the documentary film Now), Esther Sloane (head of partnerships, policy and communications at the UN Capital Development Fund), Lucilla Booyzen (director South Africa Fashion Week), Mads Morupsen (founder of Knowledge Cotton Apparel), Nadja Swarovski (member of the Swarovski executive board and president of the Swarovski Foundation), Nazma Akte (founder and executive director of the Awaj Foundation), Niclas Svenningsen (manager of Global Climate Action, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change), Patrick McDowell (PatrickMcDowell/Pinko) and Steven Kolb (CEO Council of Fashion Designers of America) and Yame Reis (creative director, Rio Ethical Fashion).
 
The Frankfurt Fashion SDG Summit will be the first SDG summit as part of an international fashion week. The summit has as its goal to sharpen awareness further of the Sustainable Development Goals and to encourage concrete action. For this purpose, going forward innovators and entrepreneurs from the fashion industry will come together in Frankfurt am Main with representatives of the United Nations, government, academic research and public life once a year.

Fibre2Fashion News Desk (JL)

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