Will Fast Fashion Ever Be Ethical?
What is Fast Fashion?
Over the past several years, “fast fashion” has dominated the fashion industry, where clothes have been made in a lot cheaper and easier process, while stimulating new consumer desires. This all started around the 1990’s when retailers felt pressured to produce low cost and trendy clothing, due to competitive threats from mass department store chains, which led to an increased amount of fashionable collections (Oijala).
Drawn to the world of high-fashion trends while not wanting to spend a fortune, younger generations have become the main consumers of fast fashion. While trying to keep up with the trends of the younger generations, the amount of disposable clothing increased tremendously over the years. This ultimately benefits big fashion companies, but negatively affects the environment and the people who work in the clothing factories (Emmanuel).
The consequences of fast fashion has become a concerning issue, especially after the incident in Bangladesh in 2013, where several workers were killed during the collapse of the factory building. As a result, attention was put on the risky lives of workers who made cheap clothing in poorer countries (USA Today). This has also led the public to criticize fashion companies for not having any concern for the environment.
Creating fabric and final products from raw textile fiber involves a lot of environmental resources, labor, and energy. This had led to “15.1 million tons of textile waste…generated in 2013, of which 12.8 million tons were discarded” (Yun Tan). Fast fashion has caused many pieces of clothing to be dumped into landfill every year, which ultimately has a negative impact on our environment.
With these economic and environmental issues of fast fashion in mind, it is certain that fashion businesses are nowhere near ethical, especially since the goal of becoming ethical seems too farfetched, and many fashion companies continue to practice unethical ways.
Will Consumers Stop Buying From Fast Fashion Companies?
Although customers may realize that fast fashion is not a business to support, they still feel the need to shop there in order to find affordable clothing to wear on a daily basis, which eventually continues the unethical aspects of the business.
“… it is nearly impossible to find ethically made clothing as it makes up only a small percentage of the fashion industry.”
Fast fashion benefits the consumers, since it allows them to stay trendy at an affordable price. Not only that but it will be difficult for consumers to find alternatives to fast fashion since “major chains typically use a complex web of suppliers in countries such as Bangladesh, which often contract business to other factories” (USA Today). Nonetheless, it is nearly impossible to find ethically made clothing as it makes up only a small percentage of the fashion industry.
More importantly, the tragic event in Bangladesh did not stop consumers from shopping at companies that had caused it. The incident had “raised important questions about production standards, but that consumer interest seems to have lost momentum” (Martinko).
Many people have argued that customers can boycott fast fashion industries and resist the urge to buy new clothes on a monthly basis. In doing so, they can buy high quality items or second-hand clothing from a thrift store, shop at private businesses, or keep the same clothes for as long as possible. While this may seem probable for some people, it is unlikely that the younger generations, who are the main consumers of fast fashion, will follow through with this automatically. They are constantly exposed and influenced by new upcoming trends, do not have the time or dedication to find private businesses to shop at, nor have the money to buy high-quality clothing to keep for a lifetime.
As younger generations continue to support fast fashion industries, businesses will try to keep up with their demands, and will continue to mass produce clothing at low prices, which ultimately affects the workers and the environment. It is a constant cycle that will never seem to end, even with the promises that were expressed after the incident in Bangladesh.
Are Fashion Businesses Working On Their Promises To Become Ethical?
Fashion businesses had made several proposes to improve the working conditions of their factories and the lives of its workers; however, they have failed to put an action to their words, since wages are still low, hours are still high, and the buildings are still unsafe to work in.
In the report given by the Asia Floor Wage Alliance, workers in countries such as Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, and Cambodia are forced in buildings without proper fire exits, and are still vulnerable to lower wages (Abrams). Therefore, companies such as Walmart are still benefiting from forced labor and other abusive practices. In addition, even though the incident in Bangladesh became a wake-up call and a reason for fashion businesses to start modifying labor conditions in their factories, there are still similar incidents occurring to this day. Two fires broke out in an Indian garment factory and at a Bangladeshi sweater factory. The companies have also been exposed for forced confinement and child labor (Abnett).
With these factors in mind, it is certain that these tragic events do not affect the fashion businesses, which ultimately reveals their lack of desire to fix these issues. They are too focused on benefiting from cheap labor that essentially fulfills their consumers’ desires. It is only possible for them to pay their workers at a lower wage, in order to have cheap clothing sold to their consumers. It has been almost four years since these businesses have made their promises, and we have yet to see them come true. Although they may start working on their promises to make their factories more fair for their workers, they would still need to think about the sustainability aspect of becoming more ethical.
How is Fast Fashion Affecting the Environment?
From an environmental perspective, fashion businesses need to draw a 2-degree mitigation strategy, which meets the goals agreed at COP21, in order to de-risk their business and keep the quality of raw materials. COP21 is a legally binding, worldwide agreement on climate change, with the hopes of keeping global warming below 2-degrees Celsius.
Unfortunately, the fashion industry is one of the world’s largest industrial polluters, and is responsible for 10% of global carbon emissions (Conca). To put things into deeper perspective, raw materials, being an aspect of the clothing industry, has the biggest impact on the environment, where they “require huge amounts of electricity and water to produce, and are sourced in parts of the developing world that are particularly vulnerable to the early effects of climate change, such as increased flooding and droughts” (Abnett).
For fast fashion businesses to transition their companies into a low-carbon one, they are required to put in a lot of investment, time, and cooperation with others. It is not a simple task to accomplish over a short period of time, since they would need a global agreement from the producers of cotton to the consumers who wear their clothing. Another difficulty that interferes with the COP21 agreement is that they rely on textiles for their clothing, which take up most of the chemicals produced in the world. Garments are also creating vast amounts of carbon emissions per item, per year.
Many argued that fashion brands have a chance to eliminate the risks and consequences of fast fashion by speeding up tech advances that the fashion industry can benefit from, such as running a textile collection program that allows customers to drop off old clothes in stores. Although this may be helpful, it is not guaranteed that every customer will cooperate in this program, since Americans throw out 70lbs of clothing per person, per year. Nonetheless, becoming sustainable will be a difficult and lengthy process for the fast fashion industry, especially when it conflicts with the purpose of their business goals.
How Does the Fast Fashion Business Model Interfere With Becoming Ethical and Sustainable?
Due to its business model, fast fashion would no longer be called “fast fashion” if they were to change into an industry that is more ethical and sustainable.
Their business model is constructed in a way to accelerate the time between production and consumption, so that there will be a wide availability of low-cost garments and apparel. This can happen by taking advantage of markets in developing countries, in which they account “for nearly 75 percent of all clothing exports and the removal of several import quotas has allowed companies to take advantage of the even lower cost of resources” (Bruce and Daly). Businesses are taking advantage of workers in the developing countries by paying them incredibly low wages.
In addition, fast fashion is centered around rapid manufacturing and mass production. Consequently, their fast-response systems encourage disposability, and their mass production of cheap clothing is a huge waste of resources, such as fuel and water (The Fashion Law).
Nonetheless, if the fast fashion industry tries to become ethical and sustainable, their business model will have no purpose. Becoming sustainable will mean that they must slow down their mass production of clothing, in order to reduce the use of raw materials, energy, water, and other resources that contribute to climate change. In addition, becoming ethical will mean that they will no longer have clothing sold at lower prices because they would have to pay their workers higher wages, while also making sure that factory buildings are safe to work in.
Overall, while trying to accomplish these things, the fast fashion industry will lose the main two aspects of their business model: being fast and having low-cost clothing. A fast fashion company that has challenged their business model, by becoming sustainable, is H&M. However, their journey on becoming sustainable has led them to only transition from fast changing trends to personal style. This, of course, slows down the speed of fast fashion.
How Can We Make A Change in the Unethical World of Fast Fashion?
“…the fashion industry, as a whole, must network together to create change, where fashion businesses bring together their resources and where industry leaders learn from each other.”
Although it is impossible for the fast fashion industry to become ethical and sustainable, it is still possible for consumers, designers, retailers, and industry leaders to work together to eliminate some of the negative impacts of it. In order to reduce the environmental impact of fast fashion, the people must protest and pressure the suppliers to publicly disclose their pollution, and designers should choose their materials carefully while eliminating toxic chemicals. Also, industry leaders should be more truthful about their businesses, and begin to change the process of making their products. More importantly, the fashion industry, as a whole, must network together to create change, where fashion businesses bring together their resources and where industry leaders learn from each other. With this, the fashion industry can possibly achieve lasting, sustainable change.
Works Cited
Abnett, Kate. “What the COP21 Climate Agreement Means for Fashion.” The Business of Fashion, 16 December 2015.
Abrams, Rachel. “Retailers Like H&M and Walmart Fall Short of Pledges to Overseas Workers.” The New York Times, 31 May 2016.
Bruce, Margaret, and Lucy Daly. “Buyer Behavior For Fast Fashion,” Journal of Fashion Marketing and Management: An International Journal, Vol. 10 Issue: 3, pp.329–344, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, 2006.
Conca, James. “Making Climate Change Fashionable — The Garment Industry Takes on Global Warming.” Forbes, 3 December 2015.
Emmanuel, Ann. “Fast Fashion — Can It Be Ethical?” Good On You, 25 May 2015.
“Fast Fashion.” The Fashion Law, 3 October 2016.
Martinko, Katherine. “Fast fashion will never be sustainable, no matter what companies say.” TreeHugger, 19 June 2014.
Oijala, Leena. “What is Fast Fashion?” Leaf, 2017.
“Shoppers Face Hurdles Finding Ethical Clothing.” USA Today, 5 May 2013.
Zhai, Yun Tan. “What Happens When Fashion Becomes Fast, Disposable And Cheap?” NPR, 10 April 2016.
