Over the past few years, as environmental and social concerns have started to attract the attention of the masses, many businesses and organizations have stepped forward to bring about a more sustainable approach toward the production and selling of goods.
The popularity and commitment shown towards the UN SDG are just one piece of evidence that can justify this. For the most part, the global community has started to acknowledge some bold facts like how our insanely unreasonable usage and wastage of natural resources could end up in our planet quite literally falling apart.
This concern has naturally been accompanied by plans and strategies to help combat these environmental issues and sustainable fashion is one such major example.
But the question here remains:
Is it any good or not?
Is sustainable fashion just in 'fashion', a fancy marketing tool that businesses use to appear more socially desirable, or could it potentially act as the savior of our planet, the ticket to a golden future?
Well, there is no yes or no answer to this because, like most other matters, this is subjective. However, there is no ambiguity that sustainable fashion when done in a 'sustainable' way promises nothing but goodness.
What do I mean when I say sustainable fashion when done the sustainable way? Sounds a bit meaningless? It actually isn't.
The sad reality is that many businesses have started to exploit sustainable fashion. To them it has become a way of getting popularity among consumers, keeping up with competitors, and creating an overall well-polished look that can help their business grow. So while they may use the label of sustainability to promote their products, behind closed doors these businesses will be involved in practices such as using toxic dyes, paying unfair wages, and overworking their laborers to keep up with the insane demand the fashion industry faces. The truth is that posting a picture showing how you participated in this brilliant plantation drive may be an excellent way of getting encouragement online but if you continue using plastic, wasting water, and exploiting your labor, you are NOT sustainable.
The incentive behind sharing this was simply to make people more aware. Whenever you are buying from a fashion brand that calls itself sustainable, do some research and double-check. This way you can be sure that you are buying only from authentic places and support those who are fighting for a genuine cause. Having said this it is also crucial to acknowledge how sustainable fashion can help revolutionize the world.
● Sustainable fashion involves practices that help save water. At present, the fashion industry uses tons and tons of water, much more than other industries. While this can be explained through the industry's greater need for this natural resource, the fact that can not go ignored is that it is also responsible for greater water wastage. This problem alone can cause a lot of environmental concerns with the most notable one being water shortage and then thousands of other problems will follow as a consequence. With reasonable water usage endorsed by sustainable fashion, this can be easily avoided.
● Sustainable fashion calls for fair wages and healthy working conditions for all laborers. Given how the fashion industry is notorious for exploiting underprivileged communities by paying them less to drive greater profits, overworking them to keep up with the insane demand, and depriving them of fundamental labor rights, sustainable fashion has the potential of leading to a much more peaceful and fair world.