CHARLOTTESVILLE (USA); MUMBAI (INDIA) (January 22, 2020) Global chemicals management software provider, Scivera, and international analytical chemistry lab, NimkarTek Technical Services Pvt Ltd., today announced a new Safer Commodity Screening program, featuring a pioneering methodology for screening, scoring, and tracking commodity chemicals in the global apparel supply chain.
Commodity chemicals are produced in bulk for industrial use and account for 80 percent of process chemicals by volume used in the apparel supply chain. These chemicals include sodium chloride (salt), acetic acid, sodium hydroxide, and citric acid, among others. Commodity chemicals are used at every step of wet processing, including bleaching, dyeing, and finishing. After use, commodity chemicals are treated and discharged directly into wastewater. Some commodity chemicals are supplied in pure form, directly from manufacturers. Others are supplied to the textile industry, through traders, as byproducts from other industries, such as pharmaceutical, biotech, or agro-chem products. Historically, customary testing and screening methods have proven ineffective for commodity chemicals due to high costs. As a result, companies have had limited visibility into potential contaminants from upstream processes that could lead to downstream environmental impacts. Safer Commodity Screening changes this paradigm.
Scivera and NimkarTek work with leading apparel and footwear brands and their diverse supplier networks on chemical management and sustainable chemistry programs. On commodity chemicals, Levi Strauss & Co. (LS&Co.) engaged Scivera and NimkarTek to develop and implement a scalable solution on textile process commodity chemicals. Safer Commodity Screening is comprised of NimkarTek’s IN-SCREEN process and Scivera’s cloud-based software platform, SciveraLENS®. IN-SCREEN is a cost-effective, qualitative, analytical screening program for testing the full range of commodity chemicals used in the textile, footwear, and apparel industries. It provides quick and reliable review of commodity chemical samples, thereby offering an unprecedented ability to identify substances restricted for use by the Zero Discharge of Hazardous Chemicals (ZDHC) Programme or impurities that may originate from other industries.
Scivera configured their SciveraLENS platform to create SciveraLENS Safer Commodities to provide brands and manufacturing facilities with a low-cost, scalable method to register, track, score, and compare commodity chemical screening results. Scivera’s flagship software product, SciveraLENS Rapid Screen, has been used for years by LS&Co. and other brands and their specialty chemical suppliers to support the scale-up of the Screened Chemistry program for textile auxiliary and dye formulations. SciveraLENS Rapid Screen also enables efficient exploration of safer alternative chemicals and reduces the cost of chemical management business processes for brands and suppliers in diverse consumer product categories including electronics, toys, cosmetics, and household items.
Safer Commodity Screening enables the efficient screening, scoring, and tracking of this critical part of textile chemical throughput at dyehouses, mills, and laundries. The innovative combination of SciveraLENS Safer Commodities and IN-SCREEN makes commodity chemical management and improvement accessible to all participants in the apparel and footwear supply chain. Factories and traders can consult scores and trends to make informed commodity chemical purchasing and use decisions ⎼ and to phase out use of poorly performing commodities. This much-needed transparency will make a significant contribution toward safer, more transparent, more sustainable chemical supply chains.
LS&Co. will establish Safer Commodity Screening as a requirement for all relevant manufacturing suppliers and work with NimkarTek and Scivera to scale the program across its supplier base in 2020. NimkarTek and Scivera are also supporting the expansion of the program to other brands in 2020.
For more information about the program, please visit www.scivera.com/safercommodities.
About NimkarTek:
NimkarTek is a Training, Testing, and Consultancy company providing world-class solutions to the Textile, Leather and Chemical supply chain in the areas of Restricted Substances and Chemical Management.
NimkarTek Media Contact:
Anagha Nimkar
NimkarTek
+91-9819641527
anagha.nimkar@nimkartek.com
About Scivera:
Founded in 2008, Scivera is recognized as an innovator and leader in making the identification and replacement of hazardous chemicals in products simple, fast, and cost-effective. The company has built the most comprehensive resource for Chemical Hazard Assessments (CHA) verified by its board-certified toxicologists, with over 2,000 verified CHAs and tens of thousands of additional CHAs available to subscribers. This information is made available to subscribers worldwide through the innovative cloud-based app, SciveraLENS® Rapid Screen, bringing scalable, data-driven, chemicals management and safer alternatives exploration to all participants in the global consumer products supply chain.
Scivera Media Contact:
Betsy Murry
Scivera LLC
+1 (703) 483 1547
bmurry@scivera.com
