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From September 9 to October 3, the main biennial fashion shows will take place in New York, London, Milan and Paris. On the big screen, top designer brands will dazzle the world with the latest styles for spring and summer next year.
The wheels of the $2.7 trillion industry will turn once more. But as soon as dreams roll onto the runways of the world’s fashion capitals, an alternate reality that’s as dark as the fashion shows are bright and glittery will continue to fuel the glamor and buzz.
The average person associates fashion with beauty, creativity, self-expression and social desirability. But poisoning the air, degrading the land and polluting the oceans is not pretty. Behind the glamor and beauty that paraded on the catwalks during these Fashion Weeks, hides a great contradiction. Here are some of the brutal facts:
The fashion industry produces 150 billion garments, almost all of which (87%) will end up in a landfill or an incinerator. Only 1% will be recycled.
Textile waste is exported from the US to other countries where landfills are burned and pollute the air.
The clothing industry is responsible for 4% of all greenhouse gas emissions – the equivalent of Germany, France and the UK combined. Unchecked, fashion production would account for 26% of all carbon emissions by 2050.
Fashion is one of the most polluting industries because of highly toxic dyes and heavy metals that flow into fresh water sources, harming people, destroying livelihoods and harming ecosystems.
Most clothes are a blend of cotton and synthetics, including polyester, which are petroleum products. Up to 40% of fashion’s carbon emissions come from polyester production, and polyester production is expected to grow by 47% over the next 10 years.
When synthetics are washed away, they send millions of microplastics into the oceans – in fact 35% of all ocean microplastics are from clothing. Microplastics seep into the food chain and in a March 2022 study at the Vrije University in the Netherlands, researchers found plastic polymers in the bloodstream of 80% of those tested and of that group 50% had PET microfibers found in our clothes synthetic.
The industry destroys 150 million trees for cellulose fabrics. Cattle grazing has contributed to deforestation in the Amazon, and leather produced from that region has found its way into the shoes and bags of global fashion brands.
Non-organic cotton farming greatly depletes and degrades the soil, consuming more pesticides than any other crop. These affect the health of farmers and nearby populations. Toxic farm runoff pollutes freshwater, wetlands and aquifers and threatens biodiversity and ecosystems.
The true cost of cheap fast fashion clothing is derived from the factory workers of the garment industry. Workers are paid less than the minimum wage in countries in the global south, which is hardly a “living” wage. Today 40 million people live in ‘modern slavery’ with fashion the second largest contributor to this. Ordinary child labour.
The average person today buys 60 percent more clothes than 15 years ago, but keeps them for only half as long, and the average garment can be worn ten times before being thrown away.
The fast fashion industry is expected to continue to grow as a result of a changing population and consumption patterns. By 2030, one estimate suggests that apparel consumption will increase by 65% as 3 billion people move into the global middle class, and a recent report estimated that the world is on track to triple apparel production by 2050.
Once the garment is discarded, it must be sorted for distribution. Today this is still done by hand. And while there are innovative technologies that can break down used clothing fabric into their specific fiber types for the raw material used to make new garments, many companies are still in the pilot phase awaiting business investment or seeking help to scale their systems to the colossal size needed. Fully scaled, these technologies can bring about 80% to the fashion industry.
In a 2020 survey in the UK, over half of Gen Zs, the most environmentally concerned demographic, reported buying “most of their clothes” from fast fashion brands. Focused on Instagram and TikTok, price and convenience are central to their shopping habits. Fast fashion companies gloss over them, scouring the internet through a ‘search engine optimisation’ for indicators of the latest trends and then releasing new styles as quickly as possible – in the case of the fashion brand Shein fast, thousands every day – and with meteoric speed, deliver them to their zoomer customer’s doorstep.
While most large industries such as the automotive and agricultural industries are highly regulated, the $2.7 trillion fashion industry is almost entirely unregulated, and as a result, brands have had no real incentive to change. But fast fashion has come at a very high price. Accountability and systemic change are critical to reducing the irreversible footprint this industry is making on the planet.
Hopefully that can happen.
Earthday.org is part of the Fashion Coalition to Support the Fashion Sustainability and Social Responsibility Act (the Fashion Act) introduced in the New York State Legislature in January of this year. Out of the regulatory vacuum in which it emerges, the fashion industry will for the first time be forced to account for its emissions, water and plastic use, chemical management, map out its supply chain and disclose appropriate social care. The Fashion Act, with legally binding environmental standards, will create a coherent framework and vision for the transition to a sustainable sector of the economy. Globally, similar legislation and regulations are being proposed. And some manufacturers are even starting to create more sustainable processes.
Given the almost limitless destructive power of this industry, it is time to send a message that “Fast Fashion” is “Out of Fashion”.
Shelley Rogers leads Earthday.org’s global campaign to redesign the fashion industry and reduce its impact on the planet. Thanks to the American Forum for sharing this op-ed.
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