Asics

ClothingSports Equipment
Written By Lina K

In March 2021, Asics released a statement on Weibo saying that its local supply chain in the Chinese market included cotton from Xinjiang, and assured that it would continue to buy and support cotton from the region.

“Asics has always adhered to the one-China principle and resolutely defended (China’s) national sovereignty and territorial integrity,” it added. China accounts for 12 percent of Asics’s global sales.

In November 2021, Asics was named in a report from the Helena Kennedy Centre as one of many international brands whose supply chains were linked to textile companies known to source cotton from Xinjiang, who also own subsidiaries documented to have employed state-sponsored labour transfers.

Asics has not responded to the report’s findings.

Reading:

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Investigation
Laundering Cotton: How Xinjiang Cotton is Obscured in International Supply Chains
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An investigation into how forced-labor-produced cotton and cotton-based goods from the Uyghur Region wend their way into international supply chains. Based on international trade and customs data, the report concludes that at the same time as Xinjiang cotton has come to be associated with human rights abuses and to be considered high risk for international brands, China's cotton industry has benefited from an export strategy that obscures cotton's origin in the Uyghur Region.

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There’s a good chance your cotton T-shirt was made with Uyghur slave labor
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China is by many measures now the world’s largest economy, and in the wake of this boycott, major global apparel companies including Inditex and PVH have removed policies against forced labor from their websites. So far these companies are in the minority, but they own global brands such as Zara, Tommy Hilfiger and Calvin Klein. As long as there is a market for goods sourced from the Uyghur region, the Chinese government will be emboldened to keep operating the mass detention camps where Uyghur people are being held in indentured servitude.

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Hugo Boss, Asics will continue buying Xinjiang cotton
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Several international clothing brands, including Hugo Boss and Asics, have vowed to continue buying Xinjiang cotton after reports of alleged human rights abused led West countries to impose sanctions on China. “Xinjiang’s long-stapled cotton is one of the best in the world. We believe top quality raw materials will definitely show its value,” German luxury fashion house Hugo Boss said in a statement posted on its official Weibo account on Thursday night.

Reporting
Lina K
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