ASSIGNMENT
ASSIGNMENT ON:
SUBMITTED TO:
SUBMITTED BY:
“M.B.A 3rd
“TOTAL QUALITY MANAGEMNT”
This assignment is the display of knowledge according to the requirement of the degree program Of
MASTER IN BUSSINESS ADMINISTRATION
UNIVERSITY OF
COLLEGE OF SCINCE AND TECNOLOGY
Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 and Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000
Oeko-Tex® Standard 100
Through Oeko-Tex® Standard 100, Orbit Baby is committed to fabrics that are hypoallergenic and safe for both your child and the environment.
We believe that of all the materials in car seats and strollers, you should be most concerned about the chemical safety and environmental credentials of the fabrics. This is for the simple reason that the fabrics are primarily what your child sits on, sleeps against, and touches on an everyday basis.
At Orbit Baby, we have taken a singular leadership position by committing to using fabrics that are certified to Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 (also known as Oekotex and Öko-Tex Standard 100). This is an international certification that sets limits for over 100 harmful chemicals, substances, and emissions in textiles. Besides being the only valid certification of its kind, the Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 is very thorough in the substances it addresses: There are tests for compounds ranging from harmful heavy metals like lead and arsenic, to many known allergy-inducing and irritating chemicals. The list includes pesticides, phthalates, dyes, and VOC emissions.
This standard also reaches deep into the supply chain, instead of being only a lab-based guideline. In order to supply a compliant fabric, a fabric factory is required to work closely with the International Oeko-Tex® Association and to renew their fabric certifications yearly to ensure continuing quality. In addition, by making sure our products are cleaner, we are making sure our environment is cleaner – by sourcing Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 textiles, we use less of the 100 substances covered, and so are helping to reduce the amounts of these potentially harmful chemicals released into the environment. Oeko-Tex® helps to keep things like formaldehyde, heavy metals, and harmful dyes out of our product waste and therefore our soil, groundwater, and air.
Orbit Baby’s efforts
Currently, the micro-fiber upholstery fabrics on all Orbit seats meet the Oeko-Tex® Standard 100; micro-fiber is the primary fabric that your child will contact in all of our products, and so it is the most important material for us to address. Specific additional textiles on each of our products have also reached this standard, and some of our products have 100% of fabrics Oeko-Tex® Standard 100-certified. We are aggressively rolling this certification out to all of our fabrics by the end of 2009. In the meantime, all of our fabrics – even those not yet compliant with Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 – conform to Orbit Baby’s industry-leading chemical safety standards. For example, we hold “below detection limit” standards on brominated flame retardants, and we have rid our supply chain of PBB and PBDE compounds.
Because of the stringent State and Federal flame retardancy requirements of car seats, achieving chemical safety for Orbit Baby car seat fabrics has proven to be especially challenging both technically and practically. The additional process of achieving Oeko-Tex® Standard 100 compliance, and of implementing our general chemical safety standards, has also been difficult. The principle we follow is “Verified Trust.” This means that firstly, we have had to take on the arduous task of finding and developing relationships with the few textile mills that meet our high standards. This process helps to ensure that we only work with mills we can Trust, even when the component costs involved are inevitably higher. Secondly, in order to still Verify the fabrics we source from these partners, we have also implemented a strict testing regimen with which we ensure compliance. This testing is done through both internal processes and equipment, and through independent test labs.
We are aware of no other children’s car seat or stroller manufacturer that offers the breadth and depth of commitment to chemical and environmental safety in fabrics. For the sake of children and the environment, we hope that our industry will take our lead and that more companies will start to offer these certifications; in the meantime, we are confident that our products offer the best choice for you and your child.
[MUHAMMAD FAISAL RAZA]
Oeko-Tex Standard 100 or Öko-Tex Standard 100
Is an international testing and certification system for textiles, limiting the use of certain chemicals? It was developed in 1992.
Responsibility for the Oeko-Tex Standard 100 is shared between the 17 test institutes which make up the International Oeko-Tex Association, which has branch offices in more than 40 countries worldwide. The criteria catalogue which forms the basis for the tests for harmful substances is based on the latest scientific findings and is continually updated; the human ecological safety of the textiles tested are more far-reaching every year. The test criteria and the related test methods are standardized on an international level and are widely included as guidance in terms and conditions of purchase and delivery right through to the retail sector. With a total of over 51,000 certificates issued for millions of different individual products, and over 6,500 companies involved worldwide, the Oeko-Tex Standard 100 has become the best known and most successful label for textiles tested for harmful substances.
The Oeko-Tex label is not only a recognized benchmark for the consumer – it also serves as an additional quality assurance tool for the manufacturer. The concept has become established as a safety standard throughout the textile manufacturing chain and enables checks to be made for any harmful substances at each stage in the production process. The test samples are tested by the independent Oeko-Tex institutes for their pH-value, formaldehyde content, the presence of pesticides, extract-able heavy metals, chlorinated organic carriers and preservatives such as pentachlorophenol and tetrachlorophenol. The tests also include checks for any MAC amines in azo dyestuffs and allergy-inducing dyestuffs.
Allergy-inducing dyestuffs are particularly relevant to textiles. Textile dyes, which can be divided into several types (i.e. disperse, reactive, acid and direct) are the main causes of textile contact dermatitis.[1] There has been an increasing frequency of contact dermatitis to clothing, in part undoubtedly to the greater awareness of this condition. Although dyes in clothing may be allergenic, there is a difference between a patch test, where the dye is placed directly on the skin, and a dyed textile where the dye will not transfer as easily to the skin; however, excess dye on a fabric may be readily available to the skin.[2] As well as this, the prevalence of sensitization to dyes is quite high among the allergic population. A study in 2003[3] indicated that 12.3% of those patch tested were allergic to a dye and/or resin allergen; the highest incidence of sensitization from the dye group allergens was due to Disperse Blue 124, 106 and 85; these Disperse dyes have also been shown to induce purpuric contact dermatitis.[4] Although the presence of allergenic or harmful dyes is of obvious relevance to clothing, it also has relevance to children's stuffed toys where the fabric may often be in direct contact with the skin. In the EU some steps have been taken towards testing for these types of dyes in toys, embodied in EN71-9, [1] although at present this is a voluntary standard, unlike parts 1–3 of the same standard.
The use of flame retardant and biocidic finishes is also prohibited in the clothing sector. The certificates issued are distributed or allocated in line with the international guidelines and specifications of the Oeko-Tex Test Association.
Product classes
The test costs depend on which of the four Oeko-Tex product classes the product falls under
1. Baby products (up to age two)
2. Products having skin contact (blouses, shirts, underwear)
3. Products having no skin contact (coats, lined cloths)
4. Furnishings (table wear, funiture coverings, curtains, textile flooring, mattresses)
“The greater the contact with the skin the more stringent the requirements”
Certification
If all components of a textile comply with the requirements of the Oeko-Tex criteria catalogue without exception, the textile manufacturer receives certification and is entitled to use the Oeko-Tex label to mark the products in the shops. The Oeko-Tex certificate is issued for a period of one year and can be extended subject to further successful testing. In order to ensure ongoing compliance with the test criteria, the authorised Oeko-Tex Institutes carry out control tests every year on a minimum of 15% of all certificates issued on Oeko-Tex products available in the shops.
1. Crespo et al, Contact Dermatitis, 2009.
2. Hatch and Maibach, Contact Dermatitis, 2000
3. Lazarov, Journal of the European Academy of Dermatology and Venerology, 2004
4. Lazarov and Cordoba, 2000.
[MUHAMMAD IMRAN SAEED]
Öko-Tex Standard 1000
The Öko-Tex Standard 1000 is a certification for companies requiring among other things compliance with specified criteria for avoiding or limiting the use of harmful substances in production.[5]
Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000
The first edition of the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 came out already in 1995. Editor of the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 is the "Öko-Tex® International - Association for the Assessment of Environmentally Friendly Textiles", located in Zurich, an association of independent European textile testing institutes. The Standard 1000 is the consequent continuation of the Öko-Tex® Standard 100 which has existed for ten years. This one defined in 1992 for the first time internationally criteria and limit values for the test of harmful substances on textiles. Products of more than 1000 companies have been tested and certified accordingly and express in this way that their textiles are free of harmful substances. |
The Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 includes not only the human ecology but also the conditions of textile production. I.e. it is investigated in what way a textile enterprise produces not only harmless goods but also in a most ecological way. It demands the exclusion of specific environmental harmful auxiliaries, dyestuffs and production procedures. The Standard demands high requirements to sewage-, exhaust cleaning, use of energy, noise and dust as well as safety at the working place. It demands the implementation of basic elements of an environmental management system in the enterprise. Furthermore, it includes the social criteria of the prohibition of child labour. |
Textile- and clothing enterprises are subjected to the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 which is a testing-, auditing- and certification system on a voluntary basis. Applications are to be addressed to a testing-institute of "Öko-Tex® International" (ÖTI, Vienna). In a first step an interested enterprise has to complete a questionnaire which helps to analyse basically the strength/weakness properties. In a second step the enterprise will be audited, i.e. independent auditors go to the production site and are examining how far the criteria’s and limit values of the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 are fulfilled and how far a sufficient enterprise internal documentation of the environmental relevant parameters is available. After successfully passing the audit the enterprise can be certified and is given the right to use the label “Textile confidence - environmental friendly production tested according to Öko-Tex® Standard 1000”. The authorisation is valid for the period of three years. |
Besides that exists also a product marking? Everybody who requests to mark his textile products accordingly is obliged to bring the complete proof that all enterprises that are involved in the production - i.e. the whole production chain - do fulfil the criteria of the standard. The authorisation for this product labelling is for the moment valid for the duration of one year. Summing up is to be stated that the Öko-Tex Standard 1000 examines in an enterprise relevant as well as product relevant point of view how far the criteria’s of an environmentally friendly - in the sense of a most environmentally considerate textile production are - fulfilled. [ USMAN ALI KHAN ] |
Reasons for the introduction |
Most of the textile enterprises in Europe have invested considerable sums in the internal company environmental protection. They have the possibility with the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 to express their environmental engagement also towards the consumer which has the right to know under which circumstances textile goods are produced today. In many countries there are missing environmental regulations entirely. Textile waste water often gets completely untreated out of the production sites in the nature and environmental harmful substances are used in the production. Therefore the basis of life of the population will be severely endangered for generations. Since years yet especially the consumer organisations demand from textile producers therefore to publicise more information about the environmental aspects of the textile production. With the Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 this step forward can be done, henceforth. |
Why do textile enterprises want to communicate the environmental protection |
The number of enterprises which want to make a statement of the environmental conditions during the production process - beside the important product controls - has increased considerably. The following reasons are: |
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The Öko-Tex® Standard 1000 facilitates an effective demonstration of the environmental advantages of the own production to clients and consumers. The obligations which are resulting from the environmental protection are turning in this way to a profitable marketing instrument with which producers are standing out against competitors and “anonymous” goods. But at least especially the consumer does profit. [ HAIDER ALI ] |
Aren't there already enough Öko-labels? |
Up to now only the Öko-Tex® Standard 100 accomplished the position of an institutional textile Öko-label. In the field of the human ecology this Standard is valid in the meantime in Europe even increasingly worldwide. Other initiatives such as the European environmental label, Toxproof, Ecoproof are in fact introduced but they could not establish effectively on the textile marked until this day. Their influence is therefore relatively insignificant. A comparable higher significance has the so-called EMAS-System of the European Union, also known under the mark European environmental management system, respectively ISO 14 000. Textile enterprises have the possibility of their production to be audited and accredited. The accreditation according to the EMAS-System however is achievable of nearly every enterprise. It has merely to proof an environmental management system and the purpose of continuous improvement of it. This system gives no information about the degree of environmental efforts. Numerous enterprises which intend to document their leading position assess the EMAS-System therefore not to be sufficient enough. |
The International Association Öko-Tex® declares a production ecologically testing - and certification system which also informs about the message regarding the degree of the environmental protection. The current edition of the Öko-Tex Standard 1000 is the result of the efforts aiming in this direction. |
Prerequisites of the Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000
The Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000 requires that companies:1. Comply with specified criteria to avoid or limit the use of harmful substances in production
2. Stringent limit values relating to waste water and exhaust air.
3. Optimise their energy consumption
4. Ensure low noise and dust pollution
5. Iintroduce measures to ensure safety at work
Statutory requirements and regulations must be complied with as minimum requirements. The use of child labour is prohibited.
The company guarantees in a declaration of commitment that they comply with all the criteria required by the Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000. The incorporation of basic elements of an environmental management system in the operational procedures is essential for this.
The company guarantees in a declaration of commitment that they comply with all the criteria required by the Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000. The incorporation of basic elements of an environmental management system in the operational procedures is essential for this.
Advantages of the Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000
With the production-related Oeko-Tex® Standard 1000, the "Oeko-Tex® International - Association for the Assessment of Environmentally Friendly Textiles" offers companies in the textile industry throughout the world the opportunity to document the extent to which technical facilities at their production sites address environmental issues and to demonstrate this effectively to the public.
Companies which have set up an active environmental management system will enjoy competitive advantages thanks to:
Ø Increased production efficiency, i.e. cost reductions
Ø Minimized waste
Ø Improved acceptance of the products in the market
[AMIR]
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