Sustainability Report 2017

A COMPREHENSIVE APPROACH TO SUSTAINABILITY Since TEXAID was founded as charity-private-partnership in 1978, we have encouraged a high level of social responsibility and a sustainable corporate culture in all our activities and along our entire value chain. With the textile industry in transition, the focus of the consumer towards textile recycling is shifting. While in the past, discarding used textiles has mainly been an act of donating them to a charitable use either direct or indirect by raising money for charitable causes through selling the textiles, consumers today want to also contribute to preserving the environment. This shift is also supported by the introduction of new waste legislation in Switzerland and in the Euro- pean Union, which demands that textiles must be collected as a separate waste stream and subsequently re-used or recycled according to the waste hierarchy. Strategy 2020 Encouraged by these developments, we continuously strive to optimize our processes from an econo- mic, social and environmental perspective. In cooperation and close discussion with the TEXAID charity organizations, we have developed and introduced the TEXAID 2020 strategy which forms the foundation for our long-term development along these dimensions. Specific measures were defined together with our employees and other stakeholders and are continuously being further developed and implemented. To make our sustainability efforts transparent and to keep our stakeholders informed, TEXAID is pub- lishing the sustainability report in accordance with the standards of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). “ At Solidar Suisse, we not only count on TEXAID being aware of and prioritizing all relevant sustainability issues, but also developing appropriate measures and objectives that are continually reviewed and improved.” Hans-Jürg Fehr, former President of Solidar Suisse (relief agency) 11