Dear mini Xiao,
When you read this today, I hope that I will have made some inroads in sustainable farming and production for the textile industry. I spent years at my first full time job as a vegetables buyer. One of my most valuable learnings was visiting farmers and factories across Asia and understanding ways in which we could work together to make growing and producing vegetables sustainable. I was sad to leave that job, but I took with me a passion to care about industries and how we participate in them sustainably so they last into the future, and our planet lasts too. Textiles is a deeply polluting industry, where production has moved to countries in the midst of phenomenal economic growth. There’s a real dilemma between supporting a country’s growth while keeping their environment clean. This is something I am grappling with now. By 2050, I hope I will have made some inroads in traceability of the supply chain, particularly in cotton in China, and have started working with producers and thought leaders on moving to greener materials. Outside of work, I have been a lover of the ocean and the life in it. I was an avid scuba diver and free diver who saw amazing creatures in the water. I want to you be able to see these creatures too, so I have committed to one project a year related to marine conservation.
