Interview with Jean Hegedus

Jean Hegedus
Director of Sustainability
The LYCRA Company

The industry can improve its transparency through HIGG assessments

The LYCRA Company is a global leader in developing innovative fibre and technology solutions for the apparel and personal care industries. Several of its manufacturing sites had their Higg FEM and Higg FSLM self-assessments verified by an independent third party last year and achieved scores in the top quartile. In an interview with Fibre2Fashion, the Wilmington, Delaware-based company’s Director of Sustainability Jean Hegedus explains the modules and their importance.

How is the textile industry addressing the issue of water scarcity and pollution caused by the manufacturing process?

Organisations are addressing the issue of water scarcity in a variety of ways, including initiatives such as using waterless dyeing, which is frequently employed in the denim industry, recycling process water, making infrastructure improvements to ensure water use is minimised, and treating wastewater onsite to allow for recycling.

What are some of the most promising sustainable materials and fibres being developed for use in the textile industry?

The LYCRA Company is currently working on an exciting development that we believe can have significant impact on our industry. This is a bio-derived LYCRA fibre where 70 per cent of the fibre content is derived from field or dent corn. We are partnering with a company called Qore, which is building a plant in Iowa, in the US, to produce the bio-derived ingredient. We expect to launch this product in the fourth quarter of the next year. This product has several key benefits: 1) it is a renewable product that will be available at scale, 2) it provides a reduction of up to 44 per cent in carbon emissions*, and 3) the final product has equivalent performance to original LYCRA fibre. (*Estimate from Cradle-to-Gate Screening LCA for a representative LYCRA fibre manufacturing facility, June 2022, prepared by Ramboll US Consulting, Inc.)

How can the textile industry improve its supply chain transparency to ensure ethical labour practices and reduce negative environmental impacts?

The industry can improve its transparency through assessments such as the Higg Facility Social and Labor Module (FSLM) which can then be third party verified. This module provides a standardised tool to assess the safety and fairness of labour conditions for workers throughout the globe and helps companies to establish baseline data from which they can improve. In terms of reducing environmental impacts, another tool, the Higg Facility Environmental Module (FEM), can also help companies understand the environmental performance at their sites and with a view towards improvements.

The LYCRA Company’s manufacturing sites recently underwent the Higg FEM and Higg FSLM self-assessments. Can you explain the importance of these modules?

These modules help sites understand where they stand at a given point in time in terms of their environmental as well as social and labour practices, and most importantly, serve as a barometer of where they can improve. The modules can also be shared among Higg/SAC members, providing transparency to those in your supply chain.

What criteria were used to evaluate the manufacturing sites during the self-assessments?

The Higg FEM covers seven key assessment areas: Environmental Management Systems, Energy Use and Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Water Use, Wastewater, Emissions to Air, Waste Management, and Chemical Management. The Higg FSLM assesses companies on nine areas: Recruitment and Hiring, Working Hours, Wages and Benefits, Employee Treatment, Employee Involvement, Health and Safety, Employee Termination, Management Systems, and Empowering People and Communities.

How did your manufacturing sites perform in these self-assessments? Which manufacturing sites underwent third-party verification of self-assessments?

All six LYCRA fibre plants completed the Higg FEM self-assessment and three of those sites – Maydown, Northern Ireland; Foshan, China; and Waynesboro, Virginia (US) – had their scores verified. Three LYCRA fibre production sites – Tuas, Singapore; Maydown, Northern Ireland; and Paulinia, Brazil – completed the Higg FSLM self-assessment and Tuas and Maydown had their scores verified. For both the FEM and FSLM, all verified scores were in the upper quartile.

How does completing the Higg facility modules drive behaviours that become embedded in The LYCRA Company’s sustainability culture?

As each site completes these modules, they are sharing their results with other sites within the company. Through our global network, this learning allows each site to adopt best practices. In addition, as part of our Sustainability Goals, we are using the Higg FEM and FSLM to benchmark our environmental and social and labour performance. Thus, these practices have become a normal part of how we do business and hence an important part of our culture.

How does Higg FEM align with The LYCRA Company’s sustainability goals?

The FEM and FSLM serve as benchmarks for both our environmental and social and labour performances, so they are an integral part of our goals.

What is the Planet Agenda sustainability platform, and how does Higg FSLM support it?

The Planet Agenda sustainability platform is based on the belief that to have a healthy business we must have a healthy planet. It is centred around three key pillars: corporate responsibility, manufacturing excellence, and product sustainability. The two Higg tools help us benchmark both our corporate responsibility and our manufacturing excellence pillars – with the FSLM benchmarking our social and labour practices under corporate responsibility, and the FEM benchmarking the environmental performance at our sites.

How do the Higg facility tools help The LYCRA Company stay on track as a responsible spandex producer?

The tools provide a consistent, globally recognised framework against which we can assess our performance and share that performance with our value chains. And because we are doing this every year, it has become a part of our culture and a part of our quest for continuous improvement.

What does it mean to be a member of the Sustainable Apparel Coalition (SAC), and how does it benefit The LYCRA Company?

Another one of The LYCRA Company’s goals is to support organisations dedicated to advancing sustainable practices in our industry. We believe the SAC is one of those key organisations. Through the SAC, we can learn and share the best practices and have a collective voice in our industry.

How do the LYCRA Company’s products and technical expertise contribute to sustainable solutions in the apparel and personal care industries?

Our purpose across both the apparel and personal care industries that we support is all about enhancing life through innovative garment solutions. This purpose is reflected in our commitment to sustainability and the products that we bring to market. Leveraging our technical expertise and years of experience as the inventor of elastane, we are focused on creating resilient fibres that use fewer finite resources, extend garment wear life, and ultimately can be recycled or composted at end of life.

What is your approach to developing unique innovations designed to meet the consumer’s need for comfort and lasting performance?

Our innovation strategy identifies the stated and unstated needs of consumer and our customers. We are guided by proprietary consumer research from markets around the world. Gathering insights to fast-changing consumer needs and expectations around comfort and fit is a great starting point for us and for our customers. We use these insights to not only identify opportunities, but to help us position and sell the benefits of our new products and technology to our customers and ultimately the consumer. We specifically look for pain points that can be solved with new or improved products or processes that add value. Once developed, our scientists work closely with our global mill customers to examine an innovation’s potential for commercialisation.

What are The LYCRA Company’s goals for Higg FEM verification by 2024?

In 2024, we intend to have those manufacturing sites that represent 80 per cent of our volume third party verified on the Higg FEM.

Published on: 09/06/2023

DISCLAIMER: All views and opinions expressed in this column are solely of the interviewee, and they do not reflect in any way the opinion of Fibre2Fashion.com.