The project aims at increased understanding of private and public purchasing organizations’ conditions, difficulties and opportunities to manage environmental and health risk in different parts of a complex product chain. The project focuses on chemical risks in the area of textiles. Based on this understanding the project will suggest how to improve learning, communication and management of chemical risks in purchasing activities. The approach is cross-disciplinary and it includes collaboration with actors from civil-society, the state and business. It uses the comparative case study approach including semi-structured interviews, document studies, and field trips.
We will, first, map assessment, management and communication of chemical risks over a wider group of products and organizations in the textile area, and second, conduct more focused case studies of two specific products within a few selected organizations (private/public and big/small).
These studies include analysis on (i) actors’ knowledge about chemical risks in different parts of the production chain; (ii) the communicate strategies and channels of purchasing organizations and other actors, and (iii) how purchasing organizations use and interpret existing regulatory framework as well as why and how self-regulation are developed and used.
Theoretically, the project relates to literature on commodity chains, 2environmental risk governance, risk assessment and management, as well as risk communication.