Apparel Impact Institute Announces Lead Funders for New $250M Fashion Climate Fund, Uniting Brands, Philanthropic Donors, and Industry Stakeholders

• Lead funders embody Lululemon, H&M Group, H&M Basis, and The Schmidt Household Basis.
• The $250M Fund will likely be used to establish, fund, scale, and measure verified impression options to decarbonize and modernize vogue trade provide chains.
• Pioneering a collaborative funding mannequin between philanthropy and company entities, the Fund is designed to unlock an estimated $2B in blended capital in extra asset courses, together with debt and fairness, to assist meet the trade’s ambition to halve carbon emissions by 2030.

SAN FRANCISCO, June 8, 2022 /PRNewswire/ — Attire Influence Institute (Aii), the nonprofit group devoted to operationalizing and accelerating local weather motion and sustainability options in vogue, introduced in the present day the lead funders in its new $250M Style Local weather Fund: Lululemon, H&M Group, H&M Basis, and The Schmidt Household Basis.

Aii and its lead companions have established the Style Local weather Fund to drive collective motion to deal with vogue’s provide chain emissions. By leveraging a first-of-its-kind collaborative funding mannequin for vogue between philanthropy and company entities, the Fund may unlock an estimated $2B in blended capital throughout varied asset courses, together with debt and fairness, to assist meet the trade’s purpose to halve carbon emissions by 2030.

Whereas lots of of vogue manufacturers and retailers have pledged help to the Science Primarily based Goal Initiative (SBTi) to cut back their provide chain greenhouse fuel emissions, massive obstacles to motion stay: In response to Aii and World Assets Institute’s current report, Roadmap to Web Zero: Delivering Science Primarily based Targets within the Attire Sector, 96 p.c of the vogue trade’s emissions come from third-party farms and factories which might be shared throughout the trade and deemed too dangerous for manufacturers, retailers, or conventional sources of capital to make mandatory upgrades and overhauls.

Following the report’s roadmap, and the financial modeling insights set in Aii and Style For Good’s report, Unlocking the Trillion-dollar Style Decarbonization Alternative, the Style Local weather Fund will present programmatic funding for provider interventions throughout the worth chain: transitioning to renewable electrical energy, accelerating next-generation supplies, scaling sustainable supplies and practices, eliminating coal in manufacturing, and enhancing vitality efficiency. Aii has created strategic collaborations with Textile Trade, Style For Good, and Solidaridad, amongst others, to deal with these focal areas.

By Aii’s distinctive mannequin, philanthropic funds will present the required type of capital to speed up and de-risk pre-seed and pilot improvements, and trade help will advance confirmed options from pilots to scaled impression. This could unlock the estimated $2B in blended capital over the following eight years.

The Style Local weather Fund is a bolder, extra pressing, and holistic evolution of Aii’s current program, Clear by Design. Since 2018, Clear by Design has aggregated and deployed over $12M in philanthropic funding into vitality efficiency applications for factories, which has unlocked $175M in financial capital in addition to environmental financial savings.

To finest help administration of options and apply use of funds, Aii will launch a Local weather Options Portfolio to function a web-based registry of early, mid- and late-stage initiatives that deal with provide chain greenhouse fuel emissions. Fund companions and strategic advisors will use the portfolio as a software for trade alignment and choices on applications and grants. Main stakeholders for this software, which is able to go into Beta growth in 2022, embody manufacturers, retailers, suppliers, resolution suppliers, innovators, foundations, authorities grantmakers, non-public fairness and banks.

Lewis Perkins, President of Aii, stated: “By aligning trade leaders and climate-focused philanthropists behind scalable options, the Style Local weather Fund opens a pathway for better collaboration and cross-pollination of options, facilitating better funding and stronger collective motion towards the trade purpose of halving emissions by 2030, whereas additionally searching for local weather justice for the residents and communities the place our vogue is made. We’re drastically inspired by the management and decisiveness proven in the present day from these lead companions and honored to play this function as we open up this first section of the venture finance.”

Aii is at the moment in dialogue with extra lead companions, with the purpose of every fund committing $10M over eight years. That is the first step of a bigger trade and capital markets dedication to reaching science-based targets. Aii will proceed to convene extra lead companions into this Fund and develop strategic relationships with funding capital, each business lending and personal fairness, to succeed in even better scale.

For extra particulars, together with quotes from lead funders and strategic collaborators, please see the media equipment.

Attire Influence Institute (Aii) is a nonprofit collective based in 2017 by NGO leaders: the Sustainable Attire Coalition (SAC), the Sustainable Commerce Initiative (IDH) and Pure Useful resource Protection Council (NRDC), alongside trade leaders Goal Company, Hole Inc., PVH and HSBC. The group emerged organically because of an actual want that attire manufacturers and retailers self-identified.

Aii identifies, funds, and scales confirmed high quality options to speed up constructive impression within the attire and footwear trade. Aii applications deal with areas that end in constructive environmental impression from the manufacturing of attire and footwear merchandise to enhance the trade. To be taught extra about Aii and its new Style Local weather Fund, go to apparelimpact.org and fashionclimatefund.org.

SOURCE Attire Influence Institute