SDG Goal 12 Leadership Forum
hosted by GlobeScan / C&A Foundation
Read the full report from our online discussion of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goal 12, which aims to “do more and better with less” by ensuring sustainable consumption and production.
Learn from the perspectives from more than 250 guest contributors who discussed how we can accelerate our transition to a circular economy – at pace and scale – inside and outside the fashion industry.
SDG Forum 12 discussion experts included:
- Brands
- Manufacturers
- Funders
- Innovators
- Academics
- NGOs
- Government
What is Sustainable Development Goal 12?
SDG 12 aims to ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns.
Discussion Summary
Overall, the forum highlighted the need for multi-stakeholder collaboration—in creating a network for circular businesses, developing strategies, and combining workforces for more efficient processes. This was emphasised throughout the whole discussion, with many participants expressing the need for a sharing platform that enables progress from actors across the value chain.
There are still many barriers to the fashion industry achieving a circular and collaborative business model. These include a business culture dependent on “fast fashion” and a traditional, linear supply chain, as well as limited knowledge of circular approaches and a lack of consumer demand for sharing and service models.
Key Learnings
Three elements are needed to make further progress:
- Collaborative action from key industry players can create and define a purpose and structure for circular initiatives.
- Demonstrable proof of successful initiatives that have visibly employed the circular model will help to gain support from the industry.
- Create expertise and a future-focused mindset, which are already characteristics of the fashion industry.
Going forward, organisations like C&A Foundation and Fashion for Good will be crucial in raising awareness of circularity, encouraging change, and accelerating the uptake of circular and sharing models.
“We need to make circularity easier to understand or, as Vanessa Friedman once said, we need to make sustainability sexy. Until it becomes what the cool kids want, it’s hard to create customer demand for it. So, let’s get the influencers involved—the YouTube stars, the Meghan Markles, etc.
– Leslie Johnston, C&A Foundation
The SDG Leadership Forum on Goal 12 demonstrates the progress that parts of the fashion industry have made toward becoming more sustainable. Sharing and applying the lessons learned will enable the transformation at scale.
SDG 12 Forum Report
Read the full report to find out more about the discussion hosts, GlobeScan and C&A Foundation, examples of circular economy business models in practice, lessons from other industries, case studies, barriers and solutions to this complex issue, and learn how consumers, brands and retailers can play a part in unlocking circular models and additional resources and a list of expert guest contributors.
download the report
About the GlobeScan SDG Leadership Series
The GlobeScan SDG Leadership Series is a set of seventeen online discussions and each Forum will focus on one Global Goal, connecting experts and opinion leaders to share ideas and actions for making progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.
Read reports on past SDG Leadership Forums:
- SDG Goal 3: Good Health and Well-Being
- SDG Goal 6: Clean Water and Sanitation
- SDG Goal 8: Decent Work and Economic Growth
- SDG Goal 9: Industry, Innovation and Infrastructure
- SDG Goal 11: Sustainable Cities and Communities
- SDG Goal 14: Life Below Water
- SDG Goal 17: Partnerships for the Goals
Sign up to be notified of future Sustainable Development Goal Forums and join our panel of experts.
