Barça and H&M break up due to the conflict between the firm and China

Barcelona had very advanced negotiations with H&M so that the textile company would be the new sponsor of the outdoor clothing of the players of the first men's soccer team, but the Swedish brand's commitment not to use cotton from Xinjiang because of the alleged use of forced labor is the main reason that has stopped the talks, since the club does not want conflict with China.

This was announced by the ARA newspaper and was confirmed by EFE from club sources, who explained that the main fears arose from a sector of the communication department and the Hong Kong office. And they assure that the Barça entity was transparent with H&M about the main reason why, for the moment, they wanted to stop the agreement.

The official version of Barça is that there is no negotiation about to be closed with a brand to take care of the club's leisure clothes and that at this moment the asset is not a priority either because there are other much more urgent matters. This sponsorship could have meant around 3 million euros per year.

The H&M statement was published in 2020 and denounced that different civil organizations had spread the existence of labor camps in the Xinjiang region, located in northeast China, where citizens of the Uighur Muslim minority had been exploited.

Since then, There was retaliation from China against H&M for this decision, and currently the Swedish brand does not appear on some of the most popular online sales websites in the Asian country and its more than 500 stores there do not exist in the main geolocators.

Barça's fears are based on the fact that it must renew the sponsorship agreement with a Chinese company, the electronics manufacturer Oppo, which would contribute approximately twice as much money as H&M and that has another sponsor, the insurance company Taiping Life Insurance, which is owned by the Chinese government.

In 2018, Barcelona closed a sponsorship agreement with the North American company Thom Browne to be in charge of dressing the players and the coaching staff of the men's first team on the street. The contract was signed for three years and ends this summer.