Oritain, Supima partner for traceability solutions

08 Feb '18

3 min read

Courtesy: Oritain

Oritain Global Ltd has announced a partnership with Supima, an association representing more than 500 US growers of American Pima cotton, for adoption of scientific traceability solutions for cotton. This comes on the heels of last year’s landmark partnership with the JG Boswell Company (a member of Supima) and its Australian subsidiary Auscott.

"The US cotton association has been actively engaged in working with their partners and industry to expand verification processes. Oritain’s technology provides the American Pima cotton grower with a natural solution utilizing the cotton itself to authenticate it. Multiple solutions have arisen for verification, but this is one that is being made available to the entire American Pima cotton producer community and will encompass all growers from the four producing states of Arizona, California, New Mexico and Texas," said Supima CEO Marc Lewkowitz.

The deal with Supima will expand the company's growth into the cotton industry and will also open opportunities with some of the world's leading fashion brands.

"We were impressed that Oritain doesn’t need to apply any identifier or tracer during the manufacturing or processing phases, which makes it a very simple solution to deploy from an operational perspective. The Oritain methodology simply measures what is naturally inside the fibre," said Lewkowitz.

"We are pleased to be able to demonstrate our relevance throughout the supply chain – not just for primary producers. We know that the fashion industry is highly-motivated in the sustainability space and we are ideally positioned to help them ensure the integrity of their products and meet their sustainability objectives," said Grant Cochrane, Oritain CEO.

Cochrane adds that the scientific solution Oritain offers will go a long way to address the traceability challenges that have been faced by the global cotton industry in recent years.

"Manufacturers, brand owners and retailers are increasingly focused on ensuring there is transparency within their supply chains. A huge part of this is knowing - and trusting - where their product comes from. This is of particular importance as brands make claims associated with provenance and want to be reassured their product – in this case, Supima cotton - isn’t being contaminated by inferior products coming from undesirable sources," said Cochrane.

"We have used scientific analysis, backed by over 25 years of academic literature, to create a unique ‘fingerprint’ from the cotton samples that have been supplied by Supima. This fingerprint analysis identifies the different levels of chemical attributes that are found within the product itself, and enables us to verify the cotton against its claimed origin. Using this method, we will randomly test Supima cotton," concluded Cochrane. (RR)

Fibre2Fashion News Desk – India