Events, dear boy, events

We have already spoken about how the SLTC conference on 28th April in Northampton looking interesting and the Textile conference (now postponed to October) but every year at Hong Kong the BLC along with the APLF have been running an afternoon seminar.  The agenda this year looks particularly good.  It is to be held on March 27^th and the price is around $300 with extra discounts for alumni and students. I have produced the whole list as it shows on the BLC website.

PUMA’s Environmental Profit & Loss – Dr Reiner Hengstmann, Puma
Measuring environmental impact during the life cycle of footwear production

Sustainable Chemical Management- Dr Dietrich Tegtmeyer, Lanxess AG
Chemicals at the heart of sustainable leather manufacturing

The World Footwear Market – Perspectives for Entrepreneurs -Peter Mangione, Global Footwear Partnerships
How global and local drivers impact on footwear markets

Reducing Leather Waste - Christopher Gaysse/Bertrand Cronert, Lectra
Reducing manufacturing costs through optimisation of cutting efficiencies and reduction of material waste

Sustainability – IWAY – The IKEA Way -Lin Wang/Paulo Brenna, IKEA
Discussion of the IKEA code of conduct for purchasing, including environmental requirements

US Product Safety & Legislation- Matt Priest, Footwear Distributors & Retailers of America (FDRA)
The challenges of US legislative drivers; California Proposition 65, CPSIA and State chemical compliance regulations

Solar Power in Leather Making – Carsten Aschoff, Aschoff Solar GmbH
Opportunity to reduce your carbon footprint with solar power

Biodegradability including Life Cycle – Dr Victoria Addy, BLC Leather Technology Centre Limited
Towards sustainability in the leather supply chain through an improved understanding of biodegradability

The event is organised by BLC Leather Technology Centre Ltd and APLF Ltd, and sponsored by Lanxess Chemicals, Lectra and Leather International.

One always wishes that these events could be recorded so one could listen later to podcasts and the like. The University is testing lecture capture and hopefully that will lead to wider availability and accessibility over time.  Even having one or two people on Twitter during a lecture – using the same hash tag – can be really useful.  SATRA did it for a while to great effect. These meetings are important as in environmental matters getting your facts right and your definitions correct is clearly very important. The recent video by Stella McCartney where she condemns leather based on a series of error and misrepresentations of the facts is typical.  The LeatherNaturally! response was quick and clear: http://bit.ly/wzE6I3

Good science is the foundation of sound marketing communications in the leather industry. In the environmental area “greenwash” is all too common.  Defining biodegradability is one such area. Are we talking about 30 days, 90 days, 3 years or 100 years or just saying leather is biodegradable because the skin came from an animal?

Mike Redwood
29^th February 2012