Untraceable cotton linked to Chinese forced labour is still making its way into European supply chains. RTÉ Investigates revealed that at least 15 Bangladeshi factories have imported hundreds of tons of cotton from two companies linked to a Chinese forced labour programme. They supply some of Ireland’s major clothing retailers, including Tesco and Penneys. Reporter Joe Galvin found that two companies, the Esquel Group and Jiangsu Lianfa Textiles, have long-established operations in Xinjiang. This region accounts for up to 30% of the world’s cotton. Xinjiang is also home to a persecuted minority group, the Uyghurs. In recent years, it was revealed that the Uyghurs have been subject to severe human rights violations at the hands of a repressive government system. A report by the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights published in 2022 concluded that the Chinese government was responsible for crimes in the region against the Uyghurs, including torture, rape, forced abortions, and forced sterilisation.
State media reports and other academic sources detail that the Esquel Group and Jiangsu Lianfa Textiles operations involve a Uyghur forced labour scheme. RTÉ Investigates certified video footage of Uyghur workers at their sites as recently as December 2024. These findings raise questions about the validity of promises from corporations to ensure their cotton is ethically sourced.
Many clothing retailers pledged to stop sourcing their cotton from Xinjiang, including Tesco, Penneys and Marks & Spencer. RTÉ Investigates recently uncovered that the certifications and testing methods the retailers used were allowing untraceable cotton to flood into their supply chains.
One of the certification companies, BetterCotton, told RTÉ Investigates that the system that Tesco, Marks & Spencer and Dunnes Stores used, called “mass balance”, is not designed to give concrete assurance about the origins of cotton used in a product. A former employee of BetterCotton, who asked to remain anonymous, said that cotton sourced through mass balance could “potentially include Xinjiang cotton”. BetterCotton’s mass balance system is used by many of the largest clothing retailers in the world and supports the delivery of millions of items to the EU annually. The certification system is not responsible for protecting against forced labour, and company Jiangsu Lianfa Textile, one of the cotton-growing companies in Xinjiang, is registered under BetterCotton using their mass balance system.
Penneys and Marks & Spencers pointed to their use of scientific testing that verifies the source of the cotton they use. Dr Len Wassenaar, a leading expert in the type of testing used by clothing retailers, challenges the effectiveness of their scientific testing, looking specifically at the testing of mixed or blended cotton.
“Mixing and blending, that is going to be a huge problem for using any isotopic or geochemical fingerprint…You could have cotton from the US mixed with cotton from China, and [they] might be very different from each other isotopically. And if you mix them, of course, it’s just going to be a mixture of the two, which is a meaningless result.”
Tesco, Marks & Spencers, and Penneys all cooperated with RTÉ Investigates, but Dunnes Stores did not reply for comment. Dunnes Stores also does not have a public position on ethical cotton sourcing. Ultimately, untraceable cotton that is linked to Uyghur forced labour is still making its way into European supply chains, years after companies pledged to source elsewhere. “There are other sources for cotton outside of China, and there are opportunities for companies to change their supply chains, and they do when governments demand it,” said Laura Murphy, an expert on Xinjiang supply chains.
Labour Workers’ Rights Spokesperson Senator Nessa Cosgrove also put pressure on the government to take action. She stated, “Corporations must be held accountable for their actions, and the rights of workers across the globe must be respected. Let’s take this opportunity to make Ireland a leader in ethical trade, to ensure that no workers’ suffering is stitched into the clothes on our backs.” The Labour Party called for the Passage of its Exploitation and Trafficking Bill which establishes “a mandatory register for all businesses, compelling them to demonstrate their commitment to eradicating forced labour and exploitation in their supply chains.”
These recent discoveries put pressure on Irish retailers to prioritise ethical sourcing of cotton, as well as putting pressure on the government to be more thorough regarding ethical sourcing.
