![H&M Logo](https://impakter.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/indir-1.png)
RATING
![C](https://impakter.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2023/01/xC.png.pagespeed.ic.dcJ1i_wtJo.png)
Negative
SECTOR
Fashion
Chief Sustainability Officer
Leyla Ertur
Contact Details:
LinkedIn
Stock Exchange and Ticker
OTCMKTS: HNNMY
Website
Contact
T: +46 8 796 55 00
E.mail: N/A
Listing
- #108 World’s Top Female-Friendly Companies (2022)
- #137 Mexico’s Best Employers (2022)
- #434 World’s Best Employers (2022)
- #279 Best Employers for Women (2022)
- #124 Canada’s Best Employers For Diversity (2022)
- #674 Global 2000 (2022)
- #291 Best Employers for Diversity (2022)
- #362 America’s Best Large Employers (2022)
- #115 Canada’s Best Employers (2022)
- #167 America’s Best Employers (2021)
Awards
- 2021 Corporate Responsibility Reporting Awards
- H&M Group ranked second in Fashion Revolution’s 2021 Fashion Transparency Index, scoring 68% (73% in 2020)
- Biodiversity Index 2021
Revenue
$22.40 B
Market Capitalisation
$16 B
Employees
155,000
Content source
H&M Sustainability Report
Evaluation of H&M
H&M is pledging to achieve net-zero by 2040 and to cut its absolute emissions by 56% by 2030, which stand behind H&M climate goals. In order to achieve these goals, the company made progress in different areas such as using recycling materials in its clothing from 5.8% to 17.9%. Moreover, efforts are being made to source certified materials, use less water, and use packaging that is more environmentally friendly. It has numerous partnerships to create more technological means to accomplish its objectives and support biodiversity. More women than in any other company make up a significant portion of the board.
However, H&M was involved in numerous scandals, particularly those involving human rights, and many external sources accused the company of greenwashing, also in relation to external rating companies such as Higg. These scandals are a clear sign that the path to sustainability of H&M is still long, that the changes implemented require consolidation and more transparency also internally to the company, and the company needs to prove specific progress in order to earn a better rating and regain the trust of consumers.
Sustainability Scorecard
![](https://impakter.com/index/wp-content/uploads/2023/02/hm_score-1-1024x905.png)
H&M Company Activity
H&M is a subsidiary fashion brand of H&M Group, a Swedish multinational clothing-retail company known for its fast-fashion clothing for men, women, teenagers and children. Hennes & Mauritz AB engages in the sale of clothing, accessories, footwear, cosmetics, and home textiles. The company products include accessories, underwear, cosmetics, sportswear, and other apparels. H&M Group includes nine brands: H&M, COS, Weekday, Monki, H&M Home, & Other Stories, ARKET and Afound. The group’s brands offer customers a variety of fashion, design and services.
H&M always strives to offer the very best combination of fashion, quality, price and sustainability with collections for women, men, teenagers, children and babies. Customers will find everything from unique designer collaborations and motivational sportswear to affordable wardrobe essentials, beauty products and dazzling accessories.
H&M Sustainability Activity - As per company declarations
H&M Group is working to ensure a sustainable fashion industry for all. The H&M group’s vision for sustainability is to lead the change towards circular and climate positive fashion while being a fair and equal company. Their sustainability work spans the entire value chain, focusing on their operations and, together with other stakeholders, the industry in general.
H&M group aims to be climate positive throughout our value chain by 2040. The main priorities for getting there are increased energy efficiency, renewable energy and carbon sinks that can absorb unavoidable greenhouse gas emissions. Fundamental to the H&M group’s climate work is our ambition to become fully circular. In addition to genuinely achieving sustainable development, the group aims to impact the lives of millions of people by creating fair jobs for all, and inclusion and diversity.
Certificate & Labels, Standards and Frameworks
- Task Force on Climate-Related Financial Disclosures (TCFD)
- Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi)
- UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)
- Renewable electricity certificates
- Better Cotton Initiative (BCI) certification
- Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification
- Responsible Wool Standard-certification (RWS)
- Gemmological Certifcitaion Services (GCS) certification
- Good Cashmere Standard-certification (GCS) cashmere
- Responsible Mohair Standard-certification
- Responsible Down Standard-certification
H&M in the news: Press Reviews and Social Media
H&M under fire in US over sustainable material claims – Just Style
According to the 55-page lawsuit, H&M misleads customers about its Conscious Choice line. Because recycled polyester fibers are weakened during mechanical recycling from polyethylene terephthalate (PET) bottles, clothing made of recycled polyester is likely to end up in a landfill. The case contends that in a “circular economy,” materials should be recycled and reused “like-for-like” to reduce waste. Norrna is “breaking the law,” according to The Norwegian Consumer Agency, by marketing clothing as being environmentally friendly.
How Ethical or Sustainable is Fast Fashion Brand H&M?
We give brands points based on their efforts to do good things, such as paying living wages, using recyclable and organic materials, creating circular programs to prevent clothing from going to the landfill, and being open about where and how their clothing is made. Even if they followed all the right procedures, they wouldn’t be regarded as sustainable. Due to their rate of production—billions of garments are produced (and wasted) annually—fast fashion brands are still far less sustainable than slow fashion brands. Let’s examine this concept using H&M as an illustration, one of the forerunners of fast fashion. H&M’s more environmentally friendly line is called Conscious, but it is hardly what we would call environmentally friendly. This practice of making products seem more morally and environmentally conscious than they actually are in order to increase sales is known as “greenwashing.” Additionally, they practice greenwashing with their The Loop Machine recycling program, which looks great on paper.
https://qz.com/2180075/hm-showed-bogus-environmental-higg-index-scores-for-its-clothing
When compared to similar clothes produced by H&M and its rivals, more than half of the scorecards on the retailer’s website claimed that a piece of clothing was more environmentally friendly. The findings increase the skepticism toward the fast-fashion industry’s efforts to self-regulate its environmental record and call for new regulatory scrutiny. The Higg Index was created to provide a green overview of a garment’s environmental impact. Our investigation revealed that H&M’s website actually had words like “less” and “reduction” hard-coded into it so that its environmental scorecards could only present a green image of its clothing.
H&M Is Being Sued for Greenwashing. What Does That Mean For Fashion?
H&M is being sued for allegedly “greenwashing,” or making false claims about the sustainability of its clothing. A marketing student filed the lawsuit, claiming that she overpaid for “conscious” clothing that wasn’t actually conscious. Sustainability as a marketing strategy might become extinct, and perhaps it ought to. Marketing strategies based on sustainability may become extinct. Finding a way to gauge a product’s effects and then displaying that information on a label for consumers was one of the SAC’s objectives. H&M decided to base its pilot project of environmental scorecards on this average global metric. (H&M decided to support its pilot project of environmental scorecards with this average global metric.) However, opinions on what is actually sustainable vary. Higg advises using its material averages as a general starting point rather than a marketing claim on a particular product. “If you’re causing someone to buy a product based on those claims, that’s false advertising,” said Maxine Bédat. Many individuals doubt the viability of a company with H&M’s quick-and-dirty business model.
Highlights from H&M Sustainability Report
Achievements
- 22% absolute reduction in scope 1 & 2 CO2e emissions and 9% absolute reduction in scope 3 CO2e emissions, compared with 2019 baseline
- Tripled the share of recycled materials used in their garments from 5.8% to 17.9%
- 27.8% reduction in plastic packaging
Weaknesses and Setbacks
- No progress reported for some of their targets
- Involved in many scandals
Targets vs Progress Reported
Target | Results reported |
---|---|
Circularity | |
Design all our products for circularity using the Circulator by 2025 | No progress reported |
Climate | |
Source 100% renewable electricity in their own operations and tier one and two suppliers by 2030 | 95% renewable electicity in their own operations |
Reduce electrical intensity (kWh/sqm of sales area and opening hour) by 25% (2016 baseline) by 2030 | 16.8% reduction in electrical intensity (kWh/sqm of sales area and opening hour |
Reduce scope 1, 2 and 3 greenhouse gas emissions by 56% (2019 baseline) by 2030 | - 22% reduction in scope 1 and 2 emissions - 9% reduction in scope 3 emissons |
Chemicals | |
Achieve toxic free fashion by 2030 | - 609 of their textile and leather suppliers (95%) are enrolled in the ZDHC programme, achieving 99.9% MRSL compliance for wastewater (99.9% in 2020) and 95% compliance for chemical input (88% in 2020). Reaching and maintaining 100% enrolment is challenging due to the dynamic nature of our supply chain. 81% of chemicals used were assured to meet ZDHC requirements via the ZDHC Gateway -They used safer alternatives to potassium permanganate (used to distress denim) for 79% of their denim products |
Materials | |
Use 30% recycled materials in their products by the end of 20255 | 17.9% recycled materials were used in 2021 |
All polyester used in their products will be 100% recycled by the end of 2025 | 63.7% recycled polyester were used in 2021 |
All wood used in their products and packaging will be made of Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certified materials, or fibres from alternative sources such as agricultural residues and post-consumer textiles by the end of 2025 | - 78% wood in their packaging is FSC-certified - Viscose fibre made from preconsumer textile waste and wood pulp, used by H&M HOME and Monki. In addition, & Other Stories and COS used Livaeco — made from fully traceable FSC certified fibres |
All polyester used in their products will be 100% recycled by the end of 2025 | 50.7% animal-based leather was used in 2021 |
Only source 100% recycled or more sustainably-sourced materials by the end of 2030 | 80% of recycled or other more sustainably sourced materials total in 2021 |
Packaging | |
All packaging designed and produced by the H&M Group will be reusable or recyclable by 2025 | No progress reported |
Reduce packaging across their value chain by 25% (2018 baseline), including an absolute reduction in plastic packaging of 25% (2018 baseline) by 2025 | - 10.3% reduction in all packaging (from 2018 baseline) - 27.8% reduction in plastic packaging (from 2018 baseline) |
Reuse or recycle 100% of packaging waste from their own sites by 2025 | No progress reported |
Water | |
Reduce water usage in production by 25% (2017 baseline) by 2022 | %10.3 reduction in production water use (water intensive tier 1 and 2 suppliers) from 2017 baseline |
Recycle 15% of the total water consumed during production by 2022 | No progress reported |