Planet

Planets, People, Profit, and Purpose are the four pillars of the fashion industry. Let us explore the first pillar, Planets.The fashion industry has experienced significant growth in productivity, causing a range of environmental problems. Overproduction is a prime example, leading to water and land resource pollution and waste.The United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2020 calculated that the fashion industry is responsible for ten percent of global CO2 emissions each year. It is estimated that the fashion industry uses approximately 1.5 trillion liters of water per year. (Davis, 2020) Therefore, the environmental issues and social responsibility of the fashion industry are receiving more attention and people are more actively seeking sustainability in the fashion industry.

In this context, the circular economy is preferable to the overproduction economic model. The circular economy is a system where materials never become waste and nature is regenerated. In a circular economy, products and materials are kept in circulation through processes like maintenance, reuse, refurbishment, remanufacture, recycling, and composting.Therefore, the fashion industry can implement the circular economy to achieve sustainable development, leading to environmental protection and pollution reduction.(Ellen Macarthur Foundation,2022)

The United Nations has established 17 Sustainable Development Goals, of which UN SDGs 12 emphasizes the importance of responsible consumption and production. Consumers are becoming more aware of the impact of their purchases, which is driving the adoption of more sustainable consumption patterns. Many have adopted reusable products, such as cotton tote bags, but statistics show that these products would need to be used more than 7,000 times to equal the environmental impact of their plastic counterparts each time they are used, as they require more resources to produce and distribute. (Chris, 2020) From the consumer’s point of view, first of all, consumers can change their consumption habits and stop blindly following trends, allowing the cheapness of fast fashion brands to ignore its quality, which leads to wear and tear without wearing it a few times, and start throwing the clothes away. Go to actively support sustainable development, relatively good quality clothing brands, do “buy less, buy better”, so as to establish a rational and environmentally friendly consumption.

Fashion sustainability should focus on reducing material waste at the source, rather than solely on the post-consumer stage. According to Circular Economy (2018), only 30% of garments produced are sold at the suggested retail price, with another 30% used for sales and 40% left unsold and unable to reach stores. The mass production of garments leads to overproduction and creates waste, so production methods should be organized scientifically to avoid wastage and pollution.

Throughout the entire product life cycle of the fashion industry, starting from production planning and manufacturing processes, to consumer use and disposal, the handling of chemical substances, waste, etc. is always managed in an environmentally responsible manner. In this way, it significantly reduces the environmental burden on air, water, and soil, thereby promoting sustainable development.

Davis, S (2020). Fast fashion speeding toward environmental disaster. [Online] Available at:

https://www.theguardian.com/fashion/2020/apr/07/fast-fashion-speeding-toward-environmental-disaster-report-warns [Accessed 6. 10. 2023]. 

Ellen Macarthur Foundation(2022). What is a circular economy? [Online] Available at: https://ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/topics/circular-economy-introduction/overview [Accessed 6. 10. 2023]. 

Chris, Ma (2020). Living in a material world: Thoughts for 2020.[Online] Available at: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/living-material-world-thoughts-2020-chris-lefteri [Accessed 6. 10. 2023]. 

Koszewska, M. (2018) Circular Economy — Challenges for the Textile and Clothing 

Industry. [Online] Available at: https://doi.org/10.1515/aut-2018-0023 [Accessed 20. May. 2023].