Fashion sustainability-focused nonprofit Apparel Impact Institute (Aii) announced today that HSBC has joined as a philanthropic funder of its $250 million Fashion Climate Fund (FCF).

Launched last year, with lead funders including Lululemon, H&M Group, H&M Foundation, and the Schmidt Family Foundation, the fund seeks to drive actions and solutions supporting the industry’s goal to halve emissions by 2030, with a particular focus on the supply chain, which accounts for the vast majority of the fashion industry’s emissions.

HSBC has pledged an initial $4 million to the fund over the next three years, and will also aim to provide sustainability and trade finance expertise in support of the fund’s objectives.

Jenny McInnes, Group Head of Policy and Partnerships at HSBC, said:

“At HSBC we are not only leveraging our philanthropy but also our trade finance expertise to support the apparel sector’s journey to net zero and the decarbonization of trade and global supply chains. Aii play an important role in bringing key stakeholders to design solutions that tackle some of the systemic challenges facing the apparel and footwear industry.”

AIi also said that it is working on the development of new financial tools aimed at creating incentives through access to more affordable capital for suppliers to undertake decarbonization projects, with a significant grant for the deployment of the tools provided by the Rockefeller Foundation.

Lewis Perkins, President of Aii said:

“We estimate the total cost for the decarbonization of this industry to be $1 trillion between now and 2050 – the majority of which will go towards capital investment in the supply chain.”