The Myth of the Sustainable Fashion Industry
We all know that the fast fashion industry is explicitly an active contributor to climate change and significant consumerism.
“The fashion industry is one of the most polluting, unethical, and least sustainable industries on the planet”-Holden and partners.
“The fashion industry is the second biggest water consumer and water polluter globally, contributing to 20 percent of the world’s wastewater and 10 percent of global carbon emissions”-UN Environment Programme.
People bought 60% more garments in 2014 alone than they did in 2000, and 85% of all textiles are dumped.
Zara reportedly puts out as many as 24 clothing collections each year. H&M follows closely behind with 12 to 16 clothing collections each year.
With the continued and exponential rise of globalization, these adverse effects borne from the fashion/textile industry continue to rise, with their impact felt most in developing countries.
“A lot of the fabric-dying processes that have negative impacts on the environment and our health take place in developing countries that have little to no environmental regulations”-THINK SUSTAINABILITY.
“As workers’ rights and the costs involved in producing clothing” in a majority of the Western world has increased, businesses are looking to exploit the low wages and poor working conditions in the developing communities to yield as much profit as possible.
So what can we do to curb this exploitation?
Sustainable Fashion presents itself as the ideal alternative to fast fashion and its harsh impacts on our global community. It focuses on quality and uses materials and finishes that are made to last and are kind to the environment. Unlike fast fashion, sustainable fashion is also regarded as ‘slow fashion,’ breaking away from the never-ending switch-ups and upgrades marketed in the retail fashion industry.
An attractive selling point in sustainable fashion has been how ‘ethical’ it is compared to fast fashion. As mentioned earlier, it is unambiguous that fast fashion brands like Shein, Fashonova, Zara, Forever 21, etc., can sell their clothes at insanely low prices by profiting from the low labor and production costs in developing countries. Sustainable fashion brands claim to do the opposite by tracking their supply chain and ensuring that child labor is not involved in their production process and that their workers are paid fairly.
Let’s look at Everlane, for example.
Everlane is one of the popular sustainable fashion brands centered on ‘radical transparency.’ For the sake of radical transparency, they showcase to consumers on their website a breakdown of the cost of their products — from materials to labor to transportation — and compare it with the traditional retail pricing.
Looking at the cost of a modern loafer:
Materials= $18.25; Labor=$29.16; Transport-$1.47; Duties=$4.75.
The “true cost” of a loafer, adding all these prices together, is reported as $54.
However, Everlane’s price of a loafer is $168. That’s at least a 200% increase in cost.
Now, Everlane compares their $168 (inflated 2 to 3 times over the actual cost) to the traditional retail price of loafers placed at $270 (increased by over 5 to 6 times the actual cost) to show how generous they are with pricing since they are making a lot of ethical and sustainable choices in their production.
Sustainable costs can be accounted for in the price and quality of a clothing piece. Renewable energy is relatively more expensive than fossil fuel and exposing CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. Additionally, more global awareness towards climate change and sustainable practices have made it easier for brands like Nike, Adidas, and Levis to promote sustainable pieces while keeping some prices relatively the same, or at least open to be purchased at discounted prices.
But can the same be said for the cost of labor? Are the costs of human labor in the textile industry indeed accounted for in the prices of our clothing?
Let’s go back to our modern loafer sold by Everlane. The labor cost of producing a loafer is $29.16. However, this labor cost is not the same as the labor cost for producing denim, which is $7.50. Neither is it the same as the labor cost for producing its cashmere pieces, which is $12. Furthermore, 60 employees are involved in the loafer making process. So, what does the labor cost of $29.16 tell us about the wages of each employee making loafers for Everlane? How are the workers involved in producing loafers accounted for with the labor cost of $29.16? Is it $29.16 per worker? How can the real cost of labor, and more importantly, each worker’s wage in Everlane, be accurately considered with these inconsistencies based on the type of design?
I am not arguing that costs shouldn’t change based on the type of clothing. The main issue is that Everlane’s workers may not be earning a living wage due to discrepancies in factory production that allows the company to pay varying levels of labor costs.
These varying levelbecome more difficult to assess when a significant number of Everlane’s employees are working outside the US.
As mentioned earlier, when companies can employ workers from abroad, it helps lower their labor costs due to differences in currency values. With that, they can get away with paying what may be regarded as a ‘living wage’ in a particular foreign country but is really half of what textile workers are earning in developed countries working in factories in states like LA.
This is particularly problematic in the sustainable fashion industry because a pair of jeans priced at $100 or a T-shirt priced at $25 is marketed as worth the cost, given that both items were made sustainably and ethically. But, if the workers are outsourced from regions like Bangladesh or China, where working conditions and environmental regulations may not be taken as seriously as they are in the US, there should be no ethical justification for such a mark-up in the prices of essential clothing.
Workers are still being exploited under the guise of ‘radical transparency’ and currency value discrepancies.
Reformation, another famous sustainable fashion brand, also outsources workers from developing countries. Reformation has ten suppliers across seventeen factories in China, Turkey, Mexico, India, Pakistan, and Vietnam. It ‘requires’ all its direct cut, sew & finish manufacturing partners to adhere to our Code of Conduct and overall requirements for ethical operations and be monitored for compliance and continuous improvement. Reformation has unambiguously implemented systems in place to watch the treatment of their textile workers abroad. Its Code of Conduct is based on the ILO (International Labor Organization) standards and internationally accepted good labor practices. However, there is still a lot of ambiguity in their efforts. How strictly enforced are these requirements to ensure ethical treatment of workers? Ensuring that suppliers adhere to the minimum standards of ethical treatment may lead to working conditions that are still unfair compared to those in developing countries.
Most importantly, what about the indirect cut, sew & finish manufacturing partners? These partners are often in developing countries with poor working conditions. Since the Code of Conduct is more strictly enforced on direct manufacturers, indirect manufacturing partners may exploit its workers. And because ethical brands like Reformation do not have a direct relationship with such manufacturers, they can get away with exploitation and unethical practices using “plausible deniability.”
Plausible deniability occurs when someone can deny involvement in illegal or unethical activities because there is no clear evidence to prove involvement. It is also when an entity can deny responsibility or knowledge of wrongdoing due to a lack of evidence proving the allegation.
So, ethical brands, like unethical and fast-fashion brands, can profit from exploiting textile workers that are not in their direct supply chain.
Levis Strauss & Co. has its set of rules and principles regarding ethical practices in its supply chain. Its Terms of Engagement specify the requirements of all its contract factories. Licensees must abide by ethical standards and address issues of child labor, forced labor, disciplinary practices, working hours, wages and benefits, freedom of association, discrimination, etc. Yet, about two years ago, a labor rights group revealed that there had been widespread sexual abuse against female garment workers by managerial staff in its factories (as well as the CHildren’s Place and Wrangler’s factories) in Lesotho.
In response to this, Michael Kobori, vice president of sustainability at Levi Strauss & Co., asserted that such form of abuse “would not be tolerated” and that the company would develop a “corrective action plan.” The brand’s manufacturers followed with a joint statement stating that they want all workers, especially women, to feel “safe, valued and empowered.”
However, without a direct chain of command between the vice president of sustainability and the bosses in charge of the workers in Lesotho, it is easy for cases of sexual violence and harassment to occur often with little to no accountability, regardless of the verbal claims advocating for change.
“Sustainable” brands, regardless of how successful they can market their sustainable and ethical practice, are just as complicit in the exploitation of workers as fast-fashion brands are. There is no reason to charge as much as $150 for the price of jeans for the sake of ethical production when the very textile workers making these clothes are being exploited and cannot begin to afford such a price.
So, where do we go from here?
We can start by investing in small businesses. A growing number of small businesses employ workers within their countries, and the high prices of their products better reflect the effort they put into their production and delivery. ‘You Matter’ by Demetrius Harmon is a good example. Los Angeles Apparel is a growing small business specializing in many basics and general accessories that are on-trend. Most of its clothes and accessories are reasonably priced, and its workers are in California and receive a living wage. It is thus easier to look out for a direct relationship and transparent accountability regarding how its workers are treated.
It is hard to support brands that are 100% ethical, and I am not saying we should start boycotting and depend solely on thrift stores. We can still buy from brands that we love. At the very least, we should buy from brands that are making an apparent effort to prioritize the rights and needs of their textile workers and are making sustainable and high-quality pieces more accessible to the general public through discounts and sales. Not everyone can afford a $52 pair of shorts, or a $220 pair of jeans.
Above all, we must use our understanding of the textile industry’s exploitative nature to keep our favorite brands accountable at every step they take and with every progressive ad they produce. With more attention on this issue of workers’ exploitation, we can hopefully make workers’ rights as essential and easy to uphold as switching to renewable practices to protect our planet.
