Like most people, when you are shopping for clothes it is hard to turn down a good deal. 50% off? Buy one, get one free? Only a four dollar T-shirt? Yes, please!
However, it may be time to rethink that mindset, did you know that one garbage truck worth of textiles is thrown in a landfill or burned each second? As it turns out cheap steals can have a steep price when it comes to the planet’s aquatic ecosystems, water availability, and growing CO2 emissions. However, we hold the power and changing our consumer choices on an individual level can help to shift this narrative.
Today in society, we are producing, consuming, and disposing of fashion goods at an alarming rate. The fashion industry draws us in by encouraging the latest trend while discarding last week’s craze (I literally can’t keep up). This marketing push, combined with the access to stores such as Amazon right at our fingertips, we in turn, fall victim to a vicious and unsustainable cycle. This model of quick and cheap production of clothes is known as fast fashion.
Globally, fast fashion has taken storm as the new business model for all retailers and manufacturers. This new take on production has only further encouraged the high rate consumption of garments with 80 Billion pieces of new clothing being purchased each year. This also fuels excessive waste. It is time we take a step back and recognize that this is a destructive business model that is having serious consequences on our environment.
One of those consequences is the major issue of microfibers that are being found in coastal and aquatic ecosystems as a result of garment waste. Microfibers, specifically synthetic fibers, are being found in deep sea sediments and ingested by fish which then cannot be broken down in the organism. These synthetic fibers that are widely used in manufacturing are extremely difficult to breakdown sometimes taking decades.
Another difficulty that fast fashion presents us with is, its reliance on massive amounts of water for the production of clothing. The industry uses 79 million cubic meters of water each year. This vast quantity of water consumption is in part, a result of one of the most popular clothing fibers, cotton. Cotton is also one of the most water intensive crops requiring massive amounts of irrigation. As we know, water is a finite resource, and in time, these excessive water use practices will not sustain.
The growing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere are largely in response to the fast fashion industry. Their production of materials and use of garments are the leading contributors to the negative impacts on the climate. They are not slowing down either, the fashion industry’s levels of atmospheric CO2 is only going to increase, projecting that by 2030 there could be a 60% increase, which would result in 2.8 billion tons of atmospheric CO2.
Although fast fashion is hard to hide from, as consumers we have to take control and be conscious of how we are buying our clothes (power to the people, am I right?). Ali Tate Cutler, a model, body-positivity and environmental activist reminds consumers to ask themselves these key questions when they are thinking about purchasing items of clothing.
“What brands are we buying from that have bad environmental practices? Can we avoid fast fashion whenever possible? Are any of the items on my wish list found at thrift stores? Do I see any brands that I like actively trying to shift to more sustainable methods of production?” encourages Cutler.
So whether it’s shopping at a second-hand store, (reduce, reuse, recycle), checking the tags to see what the material is made out of, or finding new sustainable clothing brands (check out the H&M Conscious Collection) there are many ways that we, as buyers, can help to reduce our impact on the environment.
XOXO for now,
Alex
Edited by Isabelle Vogell