Driving Change: Cascale Policy Priorities
We are dedicated to driving positive change within the consumer goods industry through proactive advocacy, setting the stage for a sustainable future driven by smart, harmonized regulations and collaboration.
Read about our policy priorities below.
From driving circularity and sustainability in our sector to promoting responsible practices, our industry is facing several key challenges that can only be addressed through collaborative partnerships, groundbreaking tools, and trusted leadership for industry sustainability.
As the world continues to confront mounting challenges like environmental degradation, social injustice, and economic volatility, Cascale centers its strategic plan around three foundational impact goals:
Given our focus, we have outlined our priorities for policy decision-makers to play their part in driving systemic change in our sector.
While our policy priorities directly stem from our strategic plan and impact goals, the aim of the priorities outlined below will be used to encourage policymakers to focus on the areas that will foster meaningful and impactful change for our sector.
Our Policy Priorities
To create change on a global scale, a level of comparability must be created, to understand where we are and what must be achieved to move towards a global level playing field. While true harmonization of global legislation would be the perfect outcome, national and regional specificities must be taken into consideration. Recognizing the role of established industry initiatives while relying on global standards and certifications as well as strengthening national enforcement of existing legislation would constitute the essential first steps on that journey and paramount to achieving progress in the areas of climate change, decent work, and a nature-positive future.
Collaboration between all actors within the supply chain is needed to tackle the most pressing societal as well as environmental challenges. From policymakers to manufacturers, from brands and retailers to consumers, partnerships are key to promoting better understanding between stakeholders and to co-create solutions that drive rapid progress at scale.
Utilizing the power of data is paramount to enable businesses to meet their climate, social, and environmental responsibilities. Due to the globalized nature of the industry, the development of common reporting standards, that work across regions, will help businesses of all sizes to better understand their climate, environmental, and social impacts and implement effective mitigation strategies.
Combatting Climate Change
A prerequisite for successfully combating climate change lies in a science-based reduction of greenhouse gas emissions and the transition to renewable energy. This must include the elimination of coal-powered energy in favor of renewable electricity, as well as the promotion of energy efficiency at all levels of the supply chain. Combating climate change will rely heavily on the uptake of new, innovative approaches and technologies. Through the promotion of green bonds or trade
cooperation, for example, companies can accelerate the uptake and deployment of low-carbon solutions.
Ensuring Decent Work For All
Companies have to navigate the increasing complexity and global nature of supply chains and support building capacities for sharing reliable information across supply chains. As such, due diligence requirements should support companies’ efforts in the areas of environmental and social impacts. In addition, companies should be encouraged to adopt responsible purchasing practices that strengthen social and environmental protection across the value chain.
Shaping a Nature-Positive Future
Designing out the environmental impact of a product is critical to moving towards a more circular system. As such, through incentivized circular design practices brands, retailers, and manufacturers can make sustainable products become the norm.
Consumers and businesses need a level playing field when it comes to understanding and making environmental claims, respectively. In order to incentivize the industry to work towards minimizing its impact on nature, harmonized legislation with a common, comparable, science-based methodology for assessing environmental claims is needed.
Across the globe, a common approach is needed to establish clear waste categorization rules to enable designers and manufacturers to make circular and sustainable choices. In doing so, waste generation can be mitigated, and valuable secondary resources can be fed back into the system.
How We’re Creating an Impact
We provide a space for small and big brands, retailers, manufacturers, and affiliates, as well as other interested stakeholders, to share their viewpoints and experiences, and learn in a pre-competitive environment.
The Higg Index is a suite of five tools that aim to standardize a collective effort of sustainability across the supply chain. We developed these tools to help organizations make the best choices based on the information at hand, because systematic change starts by identifying, understanding and measuring areas of improvement to make a comprehensive plan.
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