Sustainability in the Fashion Industry and Sustainable Fashion Jobs

In today's blog post we'll be exploring sustainability in the fashion industry, and the types of work that people do in this industry to make it more sustainable.

Let's start with some glaring statistics about the fashion industry.

Did you know that 60% of clothes are thrown away within a year of purchase? (State of Matter Apparel)

Less than 1% of these clothes are recycled and turned into new textiles which leaves 59% of unaccounted clothes unrecyclable and likely still at the landfill site.

(Ellen MacArthur Foundation)

Sustainability is the practice of limiting our use of current resources, without compromising its future availability. The long-term outlook is to achieve economic, environmental and social wellbeing.

The fashion industry is one of the leading pollutants threatening sustainability. The emergence of fast-fashion has led to consumers buying cheap clothes from brands like: SHEIN, Prettylittlething, GAP, Adidas, BOOHOO and Missguided.

But what is fast fashion?

Fast fashion is the practice of rapidly producing mass clothes within a short time frame to keep up with latest fashion trends while also being cheap and affordable. This feeds into a consumerist mindset of wanting to purchase clothes after clothes while only wearing it for a short amount of time before it gets thrown away.

working in fast-fashion, sustainable fashion — Working in fast-fashion

A Breakdown of Fast Fashion Production to Consumer

Let's look at the steps between production to when fashion reaches the consumer.

Fashion Trend Identification

Fast fashion companies analyse celebrities, fashion shows and social media for trends where companies try to replicate fashionable in demand clothing and accessories. The design process involves quick sketches and material sourcing.

Material Sourcing

Many fast fashion companies look to purchase cheap and easily accessible materials in bulk. Synthetic materials such as: polyester, acrylic, spandex, nylon and rayon are widely used, due to their versatility and durability. Organic materials such as cotton or linen are expensive due to labour intensive extraction.

Manufacturing and Production of Goods

Once the design is finalised, many companies outsource their manufacturing and production to Southeast Asian countries: India, Bangladesh, Vietnam and China. These countries account for ‘...at least 61 percent of the global apparel imports.’ (Wiafe)

Distribution and Logistics

Clothes are then directly shipped to distribution centres where they are ready to be shipped to consumers. A lot of fast fashion companies have warehouses where once an online order is placed it directly can be shipped to the buyer.

Marketing

Retail stores are placed in high traffic areas so they can be easily found by consumers. Fast-fashion companies will advertise their product online and through bus-stop and banner advertisements to promote their upcoming or new collections.

Consumer Purchase

These targeted advertisements feed into a high consumption mindset where buyers will feel like they are missing out on trends and the new fashionable item, prompting them to purchase new clothes. A lot of fast-fashion clothing, features participant collaboration from reality TV shows such as: Love Island, once an item is worn for promotion, fast fashion brands increase production so buyers can also purchase the next “big thing”.

Post-purchase

After purchase, some clothes have a short product life cycle where it has been worn either once or a few times. As the trend or hype passes, the item gets discarded while it is replaced by a newer trending item.

Cycle Loop

Many fast-fashion companies base their production of clothing on consumer feedback, sales data and trend analytics. These brands adapt to consumer preferences where they release multiple collections within a single season. Some brands will have sister brands, releasing new collections across their brand lines.

How Environmentally Sustainable is Fast-Fashion?

After giving the breakdown of what goes into the production of your clothes. Here is the reality of consuming clothes made by fast-fashion brands.

The highly popular synthetic materials are derived from petrochemicals, known as petroleum which is a crude oil (fossil fuel). This is not a renewable energy source as it is man-made and not biodegradable. So this will take more than one hundred years to break down!

The extraction of petroleum is energy intensive and has negative environmental impacts such as: habitat destruction, oil spills harming marine life and emitting greenhouse gases contributing to climate change.

A high carbon footprint is created from the polymerisation of synthetic fibres leading to air and water pollution. The production process emits volatile organic compounds and toxic chemicals.

Synthetic fibres contribute to micro-plastic pollution which is too small to be filtered out by water waste companies, therefore allowing it to enter the food chain. Microplastics can block key blood vessels which can lead to a heart attack or increase cardiovascular diseases. (Corliss and Cannon)

Sweatshop factories actively pollute the surrounding local environment within these countries. For example in Bangladesh, textile dye wastewater makes its way down streams or groundwater which affects marine life, but also drinking water. Crops are watered with these contaminated waters which enter the food chain causing health issues. (Bandera)

sustainable fashion jobs — Negative impacts of fast-fashion

How Economically Sustainable is Fast-Fashion?

Garment workers within these sweatshop factories are massively affected. Many workers in China, Bangladesh, India, Vietnam and other countries are subjected to a poor pay and work long hours in poor conditions. Many garment workers are paid less than the minimum wage, sometimes $0.03 cents per hour working up to 100+ hours a week. (“Sweatshop Workers Conditions”)

Children as young as 5 years old work in sweatshop factories instead of going to school. This prevents them from getting educational qualifications where they can get a job in the future. (“Child Labour in Sweatshops”)

How Can You Reduce Waste and Shop more Sustainably?

Support local independent shops
Buy from sustainable brands
Buy high quality products from ethically conscious and transparent brands
Buy second hand clothes from thrift stores or e-commerce platforms like Vinted
Reuse plastic bags or purchase tote bags
Take any used products to a take back scheme programme where they will recycle products for you
Encourage clothing swaps or rentals