We all have been told a million times that “when you’re young, you’ve got all the time in the world”.
But it seems like even for young people, in today’s world, being able to slow down or even stop is the greatest of luxuries. We often find ourselves stuck in the frenzy of our everyday life, in the quickness of changes and the constant search for something new, better, more comfortable. In this context, it’s not surprising to see processes that before took longer times completed in way less: new objects are produced in shorter times and thrown away after a few weeks.
This trend didn’t spare the fashion industry, to the point that has been introduced the expression “fast-fashion”, indicating a business plan that in the last years has led to the intensification of clothes production, bought to follow the ever-changing trends, instead of personal taste, and destined to be replaced by new ones in astonishing velocity. The quality of materials becomes insignificant in front of the incredibly low prices that allow many more people to afford many more products. Examples of this are multinational companies like Zara or H&M, but the situation gets worse every day if we look at the fast rise of “ultra-fast fashion” and of brands now famous like Shein.
The Chinese company led these processes to unimaginable rhythms, growing their revenues from 2 billion dollars in 2018 to 15.7 last year. Every day are added to the site among 2000 and 10000 new articles, and the production time, from design to packaging, is barely a week. But to allow us to buy products so cheaply, someone else has to necessarily pay: so the data and the statements that the companies try to hide show us the terrible consequences these forms of unbridled consumerism have on the environment and the inhuman conditions the workers are forced to.
The clothes, produced and thrown away so quickly, are slow to dispose of and the fashion industry is one the direct causes of the diminution of natural resources, is responsible for 20% of water pollution and harmful and deadly emissions, making up over 8% of the world’s CO2 emissions, and of the ground exploitation, using more than 174 of the world’s pesticides.
Despite the situation being already dramatic, we also have to consider the reports of abuse of the clothes industry workers, living in literal modern slavery conditions: the industries, placed in developing countries, don’t respect the laws of the states they’re in. In China, women have reported working between 11 and 13 hours per day, with only one day off a month and 60% of them don’t have a contract, while 90% don’t have access to social security
In Bangladesh, where the minimum salary is 109 dollars a month, fashion industry workers earn 44.
Fashion brands protect their image through the greenwashing marketing strategy, a form of communication aimed at creating an eco-sustainable front for the company, which hides the harmful aspects by emphasizing only the apparently positive ones.
The term was coined in 1986 by environmentalist Jay Westerveld, who brought to the public eye the real economic motivations behind the commitment to ecology of some hotel chains. With the aim of reducing washing costs, these invited customers to limi
t the consumption of towels, underlining the environmental impact of this choice.
The deception of greenwashing has made it increasingly difficult to know the real values pursued by a brand and therefore make informed purchasing choices. One of the best known companies adopting this marketing strategy is the Swedish fast fashion brand H&M, second in the world by sales volume. On the website of the colossus, which has declared
itself engaged in environmental and social struggles several times, you can find a section entirely dedicated to sustainability.
One of his most famous collections is “Conscious choice”, composed, according to what was declared, by garments made with at least 50% sustainable materials. This particular clothing line was the protagonist of a “Quartz” investigation dating back to June 2022, in which the company was accused of falsifying product datas, presenting them as more sustainable and concealing their true environmental impact.
Fortunately, some countries have taken countermeasures against this phenomenon, by sanctioning and fining companies. In Italy, as established by article 12 of the self-regulatory code of commercial communication, the supervision of this practice is managed by the Competition and Market Authority.
Martina Romiti and Isabella Giampà
