The Business of Fashion has published its latest report, The BoF Sustainability Index. The inaugural report tracks fashion’s progress towards ambitious sustainability targets for the coming decade. It examines public disclosures to rigorously benchmark performance and enable like-for-like comparisons at 15 of fashion’s largest companies.

The report found that companies are speaking about sustainability more than ever before but actions are lagging behind public commitments, even among the industry’s largest and most highly resourced businesses. The average overall score of the companies was 36 out of a possible 100, with significant disparities between engagement and action. BoF found that overall progress "skews towards target setting, with data often self-reported and unverified, pointing to a wider accountability challenge."

Overall, the analysis revealed clear challenges and opportunities that must be resolved in the next decade if fashion is to align with global climate and sustainable development goals. BoF set out the below action points:

• Discourse Outpaces Action: Companies need to move past target-setting to demonstrate tangible progress.
• The Trust Deficit: Fashion needs to fix its misinformation problem with transparent supply chains and quality data
• The Finance Gap: Companies are not matching bold ambitions with details of how they plan to pay for them.
• The Growth Conundrum: Achieving commitments to reduce the industry’s footprint requires companies to disentangle growth from impact.
• Collaboration with Clout: Impactful and inclusive industry-wide efforts are needed to drive swift progress beyond the current baseline.
• A New Social Contract: Fashion must finally get to grips with systemic inequalities in its supply chain.
• Pushing Boundaries: Pockets of innovation are emerging in areas like circularity and regenerative agriculture, creating fresh opportunities for positive change.

BoF has said: "The aim of the Index is not to celebrate or chastise any company but to take stock of the progress that has been made, leverage data to objectively identify shortcomings and lay out a clear framework for future advancements."

You can download the full report here.