Portuguese shoemakers to invest €140m to bolster their competitiveness
The Portuguese footwear industry will invest €140 million over the next three years through Cluster do Calçado e Moda (the footwear and fashion cluster), a progam led by Apiccaps, the Portuguese footwear, components and leather goods manufacturers association, and the Portuguese footwear technological center, CTCP, to become “the international reference ...
Clarks 2-month strike over
The troubled British footwear company Clarks has reached an agreement with about 100 workers to end a two-month strike at its distribution centre in Somerset.
EU proposes new rules to fight deforestation, promote circular economy
The European Commission has adopted three new initiatives proposing rules to curb deforestation, to facilitate intra-EU waste shipments to promote circular economy and tackle the export of waste to third countries.
Europe, U.S. reach a deal defusing their trade dispute
The U.K., France, Italy, Spain, Austria and the U.S. have reached an agreement under which the European countries will drop their national digital services taxes as they prepare to implement a new global corporate tax defined through the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). A two-year transition period for ...
Spanish shoemakers expect to emerge from Covid-19 crisis by 2022
The Spanish footwear industry suffered severely from the outbreak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020 but has since enjoyed a 35 percent rebound in production during the first half of 2021. In an interview with Shoe Intelligence, Imanol Martínez, the marketing & international business development director of the Spanish footwear ...
ILO adopts code of practice for shoe and apparel manufacturing
To provide a practical basis for employers, workers and governments to work together to advance an occupational safety and health (OSH) prevention culture in the textile, clothing, leather and footwear manufacturing sector, the International Labour Organization (ILO) has worked out its first code of practice on safety and health for ...
Blockchain technology: hype or helpful?
Blockchain technology (BT) is generally associated with cryptocurrencies, but it is rapidly being adopted in other sectors to streamline bureaucracy and foster transparency. In February 2019, the Italian industry ministry announced plans to set up, jointly with the computer giant IBM, a national scheme using BT to guarantee the traceability ...
World Footwear helps shoemakers to deal with Brexit
The Portuguese shoe industry association, Apiccaps, has posted a useful guide on the website of World Footwear with practical checklists for shoe exporters and importers on how to deal with the new trade agreement between the U.K. and the European Union. It also organized a few days ago an interesting ...
Myanmar violence raises sourcing concerns
Many sports and fashion brands that have shifted part of their sourcing for apparel and footwear to Myanmar because of its lower labor costs are watching with awe the consequences of the recent military coup in the country. According to observers, it may be difficult for some of them to ...
UK lawmakers call for garment industry watchdog to combat labor abuses
British lawmakers have called for the creation of a garment industry watchdog to stop labor abuses at suppliers to fashion industry retailers such as Boohoo, saying voluntary codes to tackle exploitation are not working.