ISO Certification for Textile and Apparel Industries

ISO is an international organization of standard gather the experts to develop voluntary International Standards that support innovation and provide solutions to global challenges. As of now, ISO have developed more than 23,000 types of ISO standard.

Among the ISO standards, they are ISO standard for textile testing or the management system. For the testing standards include guidelines for a wide range of processes, and hundreds of tests geared for textiles. And new standards are often being developed as textiles, and the materials used to make them change.

Textiles and apparel from all over the world. They might be weaving or knitting at one factory, dying at another factory and sewing as apparel at another place. There are lots of company manufacture textile or apparel, how can we ensure their goods/product are higher standard and consistent quality? This is where ISO 9001 international standard Quality Management System can give a best solution to the organization. The standard can give a benchmark that the organization is manufacturing with consistent quality.

Textile and apparel industries are involve many complicated process and challenges, many of the textile manufacture implemented ISO 9001 to lower down the operation cost and control of the output quality at the same time achieve customer satisfaction. But some organization only see the necessary of ISO Certification when export to oversea. In fact, ISO certification is more than that. If the organization well equipped with the quality and competition, it can reach out to more business opportunity.

Globalization is happening in every industries now, textile and apparel industries are facing a dramatic change. Consumer now not just look for design they are looking more on quality, innovation, environment friendly and safety products. This ISO 9001 standard are globally used in countless companies. The standards help to ensure the organization consistency quality in every process, improve the end product quality, lowering the operation cost, reduce error, rework, wastage and increase process efficiency. ISO 9001 often involves inspection and testing in the process. For example, raw materials being tested, then dyed fabrics being inspect, and eventually finished goods.

ISO 9001 focus on process standardisation. It require to have documentation on process parameters or KPIs, input process, services or product (raw material, fabric, trim, machine, utility, manpower, Subcontractor), and measure & analyse the output (through audit, corrective action, preventive action) in the manufacturing process.

Besides ISO 9001, ISO 14001 (Environment Management System) is another ISO certification which can be apply in textile and apparel industries. Eg. Italian lifestyle brand Paul & Shark are adopting ISO 14001 to demonstrate  motivation, credibility and commitment to environmental responsibilities to an industry leader. Textile and apparel industry is the 2^nd largest polluter in the world.

Textile mills produce one-fifth of the industrial water emissions in the world and use 20,000 chemicals to make clothing, many of them carcinogenic. Every year, Chinese textile factories alone generate around 3 billion tonnes of soot by burning coal. This caused air pollution which have big impact to our human respiratory system and heart. Besides, many of the apparel hard to recycle. Studies have shown that 85% of  textiles go to landfills every year and washing certain kinds of clothes especially fabric contain plastics like polyester brings  thousands of bits plastic into sea and pollute the ocean.

ISO 14001 Environment Management System as an operation process to safeguard the environment from organization perspective. ISO 14001 is  based  on the idea that improved environmental performance. It can be accomplished by consistently defining environmental aspects and managing it to make a substantial contribution to sustainability by avoiding emissions, enhancing environmental performance and complying with relevant law.

Reference : Fibre2Fashion

ISO 9001 Quality Management System (QMS)

ISO 9001:2015 Requirements

How to apply ISO 9001 in Malaysia

ISO 14001 Environment Management System (EMS)