There’s a lot more to fashion than high heels, fancy make-up and shoulder pads, and at the same time it’s not simple to locate ethical and sustainable clothes because of all the greenwashing.
Covering many areas, this article will show why this is a critical point in time for us to turn to sustainability when it comes to fashion and clothes.
What is fast fashion?
PROBLEM #1: HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
PROBLEM #2: COMPLEX SUPPLY CHAINS AND LACK OF TRANSPARENCY
PROBLEM #3: THE RATE OF FASHION CONSUMPTION
PROBLEM #4: THE AMOUNT OF CHEMICALS USED
PROBLEM #5: WATER POLLUTION & WATER WASTE
PROBLEM #6: TEXTILE WASTE
PROBLEM #7: CO2 EMISSIONS
What to do about fast fashion as a consumer?
Closing thoughts
What is Fast Fashion?
In today’s society, artisan coffee is more expensive than a T-shirt. This is a huge problem that goes under the name of fast fashion.
Fast Fashion is low-cost, poorly made apparel that replicates the newest catwalk designs and is pushed through retailers fast to capitalize on current fads.
Fast fashion is an approach to the design, creation, and marketing of clothing fashions that emphasizes making fashion trends quickly and cheaply available to consumers.
As a result, trends come and go as quickly as they are introduced. And since clothes are so cheaply made, it’s no wonder that a hole appears after only one wear.
But don’t worry, you can get a new item just as cheap.
Some of Fast Fashion’s most popular retailers are H&M, Zara, Target, Shein, Mango, Boohoo, Forever 21, Urban Outfitters, Primark, Victoria’s Secret, GAP, Esprit…
Despite the fact that cutting down on consumption is a step in the right direction, it isn’t enough to erase fashion’s dark side hiding behind the fancy facade.
PROBLEM #1: HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS
It is estimated that 150 million people are affected by the global apparel industry on a daily basis. These people are often paid less than poverty-level wage and work in appalling circumstances.
Nine out of ten workers interviewed in Bangladesh cannot afford enough food for themselves and their families, forcing them to regularly skip meals and eat inadequately, or go into debt.
The following are only a few examples of unethical practices in fashion industry:
- unlivable wages
- child labor
- modern slavery
- migrant exploitation
- gender discrimination – the majority of these workers are young females
- verbal, sexual, and physical abuse
- forced overtime (on average, workers in Bangladesh work 60 hours per week while earning ⅓ as many wages as other Asian garment factories)
- hazardous work conditions
As Lucy Siegal says: Fast fashion isn’t free. Someone, somewhere, is paying.
People began to take notice after the Rana Plaza catastrophe in Bangladesh in 2013, when a garment factory collapsed, killing 1,135 people and injuring 2,500 more.
This event also started the Fashion Revolution.
To learn more about this topic and to understand it even better, I would recommend watching The True Cost.
It is an absolutely eye-opening documentary film that focuses on how fashion affects people and the environment.
It is a pioneering documentary film that reveals the secret narrative and encourages us to ponder, who actually pays the price for our clothing?
Moreover, human rights abuses are widespread across the WHOLE supply chain in fashion industry:
- Production of raw materials: Besides unjust labour practices, many farmers and processors are exposed to numerous chemical pesticides and plasticizers which have bad effects on health. This research by NCBI indicates that 61% of Pakistani cotton pickers suffer from skin irritations, coughing, headaches, and other health issues as a result of their work.
- Production of garments: At this stage we encounter more unfair and unsafe working conditions. In Asian countries there is no union representation or workers rights. This is especially true in China, where around 40% of clothes were produced in 2016.
- Post-production (sales, wear, use): Fashion as a whole isn’t known for being very inclusive. In comparison to the other stated issues it may not seem to be a significant concern, but it is however a major problem. Throughout the years, all kinds of body image difficulties have been caused by fashion’s obsession with very thin, white models, as well as marginalizing other ethnic populations.
PROBLEM #2: COMPLEX SUPPLY CHAINS AND LACK OF TRANSPARENCY
In today’s world it is very difficult to have full visibility about all elements of the supply chain. Many hands are involved in the production of a single garment, making the process very time-consuming and labor-intensive.
The supply chain includes the following steps:
- Obtaining raw ingredients for all of the fabrics involved – this includes farming techniques as well as soil and seeds used
- Making fiber out of raw materials.
- Creating fabric from fiber.
- Dyeing and prepping the fabric.
- Design
- Production of garments (don’t forget all the extras like thread, buttons, and zippers—where did they come from?)
- Final touches (adding tags, pre-shrinking, etc.)
- Shipping to sellers throughout the globe
- Shipping to buyers throughout the globe
There are A LOT of different hands and production entities participating. Since it is almost impossible to keep track, there is a good chance that even the most well-intentioned firms will be complicit in some way at some step.
PROBLEM #3: THE RATE OF FASHION CONSUMPTION
When it comes to the fashion industry, the scope and continuous ambition for economic expansion is staggering. The engine is powered by capitalism.
The production side of fashion is keeping people employed (no matter how bad their jobs are), and it has improved the quality of life for many.
On the consumer side, it tells us “have it all, you deserve it”.
According to the True Cost (2015) documentary, every year, we use 80 billion items of clothes worldwide. From two decades ago, it is a 400% increase.
Approximately 80 pounds of textiles are purchased by each American annually. Australia’s yearly clothing consumption rate of 60 pounds per person comes in second.
In part, this is due to the rise of the population as more people need more clothes to wear.
However it is also a result of overconsumption and unsustainable buying habits promoted by fast fashion and greatly adopted by people.
Fast fashion companies design clothes that fall apart quickly. They pursue a strategy called ‘Planned obsolescence’. This means to design garments to become unfashionable, wear out, lose shape or fall to pieces easily to force consumers to keep buying new clothes.
Be Global Fashion Network
People throughout the globe are aiming to reach the consumption levels of developed nations. Clothes last barely half as long as they did 15 years ago, but consumers buy 60% more apparel each year.
This unrestrained development corporate strategy has little consideration for the social and environmental consequences.
PROBLEM #4: THE AMOUNT OF CHEMICALS USED
When you think about pollution, what comes to mind are images of carbon-emitting industries, gas-pumping oil refineries, and other nasty sights.
What doesn’t come to mind is the fashion industry.
Nonetheless, the fashion sector has been identified as one of the most ecologically destructive industries.
Cotton is used in the production of almost half of all textiles, according to the WWF.
Cotton is the dirtiest crop in terms of chemical use, needing 25% of all insecticides and 18% of all pesticides when cultivated traditionally.
In reality, the 9 ounces of cotton needed to manufacture an ordinary t-shirt is cultivated with an average of 17 teaspoons of pesticides and fertilizers.
Besides being utilized in the production of fibers, toxic chemicals are also often found in the dyeing and processing of textiles.
Among them are heavy metals such as nickel, lead and chromium, as well as carcinogenic phthalates and formaldehyde.
This isn’t just bad for growers and manufacturers, but also for us as people who wear it! Fashion can’t possibly be worth the cost of formaldehyde exposure.
PROBLEM #5: WATER POLLUTION & WATER WASTE
Chemicals don’t merely vanish once they’ve been used in the dying process and production. They cause a significant quantity of pollution and runoff in rivers and seas.
It is estimated that 22,000 cubic liters of hazardous waste from about Dhaka’s leather tanneries end up in the city’s main river and water supply every day.
About 150 leather tanneries and footwear manufacturers may be found in the center of Dhaka, making it one of the most polluted places on the planet.
Even after manufacture, we, the wearers, continue to pollute rivers.
Microplastics enter our streams and oceans every time we wash synthetic fabrics in the washing machine. Fish and other marine animals consume them, which in turn are eaten by humans.
Microplastics are rapidly becoming a significant problem.
One way to keep this from happening is to use the Guppy Friend microfiber catching laundry bag.
There are an estimated 6 to 9 trillion liters of water used by the fashion industry every year, making it the second biggest global consumer of water.
Conventional cotton takes the blame again as a very thirsty crop.
Sustainable Fashion Matterz states that approximately 7,000 liters of water are needed to produce one pair of jeans (the amount of water one individual drinks in 5-6 years).
According to the Better Cotton Initiative a single t-shirt takes 2,700 liters of water to make. The same amount of water an average person drinks over the course of 900 days.
But, surely, the planet is well-supplied with water? Well, not really… Already, cotton growing is having a disastrous impact on the environment.
Cotton fields in Central Asia have reduced the Aral Sea’s water supply by 15%.
Fashion’s consumption of resources – especially water and oil – is projected to double by 2030.
Common Objective
PROBLEM #6: TEXTILE WASTE
Fast fashion surely does not promote a circular economy. More about that we wrote in our article 32 Easy Zero Waste Lifestyle Tips.
Textiles, according to the EPA, have one of the lowest recycling rates of any recyclable item.
Australians buy an average of 27 kilograms of new textiles each year and then discard about 23 kilograms* into landfill – and two-thirds of those discards are manmade synthetic/plastic fibers that may never break down.
Textile Beat
Fashion generates physical textile waste in many ways:
- All the trimmings and leftovers that result from manufacturing.
- The so-called “deadstock” – clothing that is produced, put on the market, but doesn’t sell before it goes out of style. Crazy as it sounds, but fashion houses usually burn these types of clothes.
- Consumers trash 21 billion tons of textile (as estimated by the Fair Fashion Center), which is then disposed of in landfills.
In 2017 it was revealed that fashion behemoth H&M — which has made much of its green agenda with recycling points in stores and what it calls a Conscious Collection — burned about 19 tons of obsolete clothing (the equivalent to 50,000 pairs of jeans).
Huffington Post
PROBLEM #7: CO2 EMISSIONS
The fashion industry is responsible for 10% of global CO2 emissions, which is more than international flights and maritime shipping combined.
Production (petroleum-based textiles), manufacture (coal-powered processes), and distribution (gasoline in transport) all rely heavily on fossil fuels.
And not to forget that the cotton industry creates 220 tons of CO2 every year.
Also, GHG emissions are caused by the clothing that is thrown away rather than recycled or reused.
As long as they wind up in a landfill, even organic cotton and other natural fibers are no better for the environment than synthetics.
As a result, they’ll decompose anaerobically and emit the most powerful greenhouse gas, methane.
What to Do About Fast Fashion As a Consumer?
Even though a lot of these problems stem from the supply side, there are still things we can do as consumers.
We have the ability to make a difference with our purchasing decisions. Every time we buy anything, we are casting a vote for the items we want to see manufactured, and eventually the type of world we want to live in.
We express our desire for more environmentally friendly items by promoting ethical companies and purchasing their products.
Fast fashion is only growing and expanding because we keep supporting it.
You don’t have to start with big steps, but rather start with implementing small changes in your buying habits.
Here are a few things you can do!
#1 – DON’T BUY ANY CLOTHES AT ALL
By making do with what you already have, you will be making the most environmentally friendly fashion decision there is.
Learn how to properly care for your things. In order to prolong the life of your clothes, here are a few tips:
- Do not wash your clothes as often: The fact that something has been worn once doesn’t mean it is actually dirty… Try washing clothes when they are actually dirty, which is usually not after only one wear.
- Wash on cold: Conserves electricity and extends the life of your garments.
- Wash your clothes by hand: This is one another way to conserve electricity and avoid damaging your clothing in the washing machine.
- Line dry clothes: Dryer shrinks, fades clothing, and wears them away. That is the lint you find in your dryer, which is basically your clothes wearing away.
Learn how to repair something if it becomes stained or damaged.
How-to guides for sewing on buttons, darning socks, and fixing jumpers are available on Fashion Revolution’s website so you don’t have to throw it away because of that small functional issue.
It’s important to master stain removal for a wide range of stains as well.
If you don’t have the time or you are not very handy with a needle and thread, contact someone who can mend it for you (even if it’s a little more expensive than buying a new one).
If you prefer to keep up with the newest fashions, try upcycling and repurposing items you already possess into new styles.
You can be your own fashion designer 🙂 Or, if you have a creative friend, you may ask them to make something for you.
The capsule wardrobe idea and Project 333 show how few clothes you really need to have a diversified and complete closet.
#2 – BORROW, SWAP, AND RENT CLOTHING
In order to keep your wardrobe fresh, but without buying new items, swapping clothes with friends is a terrific option.
Organize a closet exchange with a group of friends. That’s a fantastic way to not just be fashionable and eco friendly, but also to have fun!
If you have a fancy event to attend to, and you don’t have anything suitable to wear, consider renting clothes from a store near you.
It’s also possible to browse from the comfort of your own home numerous online clothes and outfit rental companies.
Or do all you can with what you’ve got and know that you’re awesome! In the end, fashion is 9/10 confidence.
#3 – BUY USED CLOTHING
If you like shopping for clothing, at the very least set a goal for yourself to #NeverBuyNew.
There is so much pre-owned clothing available to you, and for absolutely bargain prices.
By repurposing clothing that is already in existence, you can fulfill your inner fashionista and be more environmentally friendly.
You don’t even have to leave your house or browse through countless racks that smell like your grandmother’s basement when you have so many fantastic online thrift shops available to you.
It’s also important to note that donations are not a permanent solution, but rather a last option.
Composting cellulose-fiber clothes is a preferable solution, particularly for those that are too worn or have little resale/thrift value, since it has several environmental advantages.
Garments made of natural fibers may be composted, but only if they are 100% natural, since even small synthetic blends are not compostable.
Remove any tags, zippers, buttons, and other accessories before composting the item. Shred the fabric into little pieces before proceeding.
#4 – IF YOU REALLY MUST BUY NEW…
…do it consciously. Examine all of your alternatives and choose the highest-quality item you can afford by brands that are sustainable and ethical.
While no company is completely sustainable, try your best to distinguish which companies are having the greatest positive effect by doing more good than bad.
Examine the stitching for simple quality checks. Avoid garments with messy seams or unfinished edges.
Check out Fashion Revolution’s fanzine #002 named Loved Clothes Last for graphic examples of the kinds of stitching you should be searching for.
Choose handcrafted items, organic materials, and custom-made apparel from local or nearby manufacturers.
In today’s fashion industry, these are the most ethical and environmentally friendly practices.
Final Thought on the Impact of Fast Fashion
Fast fashion is a serious and a huge problem in today’s world, directly and/or indirectly affecting absolutely everyone.
You may think that you alone can’t change much, if anything at all. But small things add up, eventually creating something big.
So every action towards a sustainable future is beneficial – and stepping out of the fast fashion world is definitely one of them.
Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.
Edmund Burke
Let’s all work together to ensure that the most popular fashion trend of the future is both fashionable, sustainable and socially beneficial.
I’m rooting for you!