Interview with Rohit Aggarwal, President Huntsman Textile Effects for Ecotextile news

1. XXVI | ECOTEXTILENEWS | February / March 2017
President
Huntsman Textile Effects, Singapore
R
ecently Huntsman has
worked closely with
CNTAC (China National
Textile Apparel Council) on
environmental issues.
How has this worked out?
Huntsman Textile Effects has partnered
with CNTAC to raise environmental
standards of the industry in China such
as our hang tag programme that has
helped improve Chinese textile mill
productivity and efficiencies.
We also provide CNCS colour solutions
to match 900 cotton shades to meet the
national performance standards and
we also hold joint seminars with
CNTAC, supporting mills through best
practices in environmental issues by
introducing products such as our
Avitera SE reactive dyes.
We work with mills in China through
our Productivity Improvement
Program (PIP) which has also
successfully improved right-first-time
performance by up to 95 per cent.
Was the Greenpeace Detox
campaign a ‘game-changer’ for
textile chemical companies?
Campaigns by NGOs such as
Greenpeace have put pressure on
governments to adopt and enforce
stricter environmental regulations, as
well as raised consumer awareness on
sustainability practices in the textile
value chain. Through numerous and
sustained campaigns, organisations
such as Greenpeace have placed a lot
of pressure and scrutiny on multina-
tional brands, mills and chemical
companies to commit to making real
gains in sustainability and to clean up
the industry.
Do you think retailers or brands
may think selecting the Jihua
Group to produce Huntsman
SuperBlack dyes in China is
something of a risk?
Jihua was identified as the preferred
partner for the production of
Huntsman SuperBlack dyes in China
following a rigorous selection process.
It is one of the market leaders in China
for the manufacture of dyes and
intermediates with state-of-the-art
facilities. Both companies share values,
such as quality standards and a joint
commitment towards environmental
and ethical practices. It also allows
Jihua to complement manufacturing
strengths and backward integration.
What percentage of your
products do you make in brand
owned facilities and what
percentage are made for you by
partners such as Jihua?
All high-end and specialty dyes and
chemicals are manufactured in-house.
Where we need to complement our
portfolio with commodity dyes, these
are generally sourced in the market.
Do you think MRSLs are the best
way forward for textile chemical
management – given they are
based on unreliable MSDS?
The ZDHC MRSL was a landmark
achievement in many ways.
First, it clearly signalled a recognition
by brands that ‘input stream
management’ is the best approach to
managing and eventually eliminating
hazardous chemicals. Second, it was an
attempt to harmonise the expectations
of multiple brands and move away
from the individual RSLs. Third, it shifts
the responsibility of managing
hazardous chemicals to the chemical
supplier. MRSL declarations cannot be
based upon MSDS as limits are below
those required by the authorities.
MRSL declarations can only be made
by companies like Huntsman who
have rigorous management systems
that considers all stages of a product’s
individual life cycle.
How confident are you that the
global textile industry will see
zero discharge of hazardous
chemicals by 2020?
It is unlikely that the industry will
reach this target by 2020. One major
reason is that many stakeholders are
not striving towards the goal and this
needs to be addressed. However, brands
that are engaging with their supply
chains will achieve significant progress.
What would be the best
thing retailers and brands
could do to ensure transparent
chemical management?
To ensure transparent chemical
management, brands and retailers can
start with the earlypart of their supply
chains. From our experience, it starts
with engaging with a small set of key
fabric mills, as this is where the
chemicals are actually used.
At the same time, engage with a
responsible chemical supplier to
develop a pilot study on chemical usage
in the context of their supply chain,
fabric types processed, machines used,
countries where they are based and so
on. Once there’s a workable system that
delivers these, it can be extended to the
full supply chain in a more straight-
forward and transparent fashion.
What do you think will
the biggest environmental
challenge for the global textile
dyeing and chemical industry
over the next decade?
Water scarcity and quality will be one
of the biggest environmental
challenges for the global textile
industry, with issues such as quality of
drinking water, reduction of
groundwater, over extraction and
water pollution. In response, we
propose specific solutions, and
through rigorous control, process
control and results verification I
In conversation with...
ROHIT AGGARWAL
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