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SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT... 35 years already
Guest editorial – Guy Déziel, Consultant in Sustainable Development


Working Committee

Groupe Textile is initiating the creation of a "Sustainable Development Working Committee". The objective of the committee is to make public all achievements of the textile industry towards Sustainable Development and more importantly , trigger actions, which we hope, would snowball.

Even though some representatives of this industry have already been selected for this working committee, we invite you to communicate your interest for the committee, by contacting us (groupetextile@videotron.ca).


Not just a trend – a way of doing things

Ex Prime Minister Pierre-Marc Johnson, recently declared that Sustainable Development should be regarded as a general trend. In fact, more and more businessmen report that the gains generated further to this shift often exceed their expectations.

The textile sector, badly hurt during the past few years, could also benefit from this.

Can the textile industry's creativity take up the following challenges?

• Design textiles and textile applications which consume less raw materials and energy resources during production and distribution.
  
  
• Design textiles, which, at their end-of-life, could be returned to the supply chain.
  
  
• Design applications which would use the thousands of tons of textile products which presently end up in landfill sites.
  
  

Brief history

1971 – the Club of Rome, in its document entitled "The limits to growth", underlined an incompatibility between economy and ecology.

Sixteen years later, Mrs. Brundtland described the concept of sustainable development as: "sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."

In 1988 the Bourassa government created the "Table ronde québécoise sur l'environnement et l'économie". It was abolished in 1997.

Spring of 2005, Minister Mulcair introduced a draft bill on Sustainable Development and the following definition could be read: "...sustainable development means development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. Sustainable development is based on a long-term approach which takes into account the inextricable nature of the environmental, social and economic dimensions of development activities."

This law should be adopted during the upcoming session.