Although fashion and agriculture may appear to be worlds apart, BASF's e3 Sustainable Cotton program is striving to bridge the gap by developing a transparent and traceable cotton supply chain.

The e3 Sustainable Cotton program and the United Nations-hosted Conscious Fashion and Lifestyle Network have announced a new collaboration for a series of convenings in New York City in 2022.

The Conscious Fashion and Lifestyle Network is an online platform for industry players, the media, governments, and UN departments that showcases and facilitates collaborations to accelerate the UN's Sustainable Development Goals implementation (SDGs).

The network aspires to create transparent, inclusive, and transformative involvement of global stakeholders to push urgent action for sustainability, given the fashion and leisure sector's major effect on communities and the environment. It will serve as an objective platform for business and the UN system to pool expertise, innovation, technology, and resources in the pursuit of a sustainable and inclusive Covid-19 recovery, guided by the SDGs.

Kerry Bannigan, executive director of the Fashion Impact Fund and co-founder of the Conscious Fashion and Lifestyle Network, said that this is an industry-leading program that delivers a true farm-to-fashion story, bringing transparency and traceability to the forefront of the conversation.

The program will co-host a series of roundtable discussions to look into how the fashion and leisure industries can collaborate and engage in the SDGs.

Jennifer Crumpler, regional seed sustainability and fiber development manager for BASF Agricultural Solutions, said that going forward, sustainability is the duty of every organization. By partnering with the Conscious Fashion and Lifestyle Network, they'll be able to raise awareness about a more sustainable approach to making cotton clothes. From the farm to the finished product, they can track their cotton. Cotton producers can meet sustainability goals by leaving the land in better condition than they found it. There is a way to make the cotton supply chain transparent to the general public.