Clothing in Britain is increasingly characterised by a
high volume/
low value approach to business. Based
on past
trends, consumers will throw away around
680 million
items of dothing this year Replacements
are cheap
dresses can be bought online for as little
as ES
Cheap prices provide wider access to consumers
and fashion retailers argue that they are a sign of
efficiency But there is a
dark side
A new report shows that consumers are benefiting
from cheap
clothes at considerable cost to the
environment and through exploiting poor garment
workers
The
The environmental impact of fashion is well known
Cotton production uses large amounts of pesticides
and water, while synthetic fabrics such as polyester
come from limited supplies Bamboo, increasingly
used as a cotton replacement, sounds pleasingly
natural, but it is a semi-synthetic fabric
production process involves the use of chemicals
such as caustic soda. Consumers who care about the
environment may feel less guilty as they take their
unwanted garments to a charity store, but many of
these clothes end up in landfill sites because they
cannot attract buyers
The social impact of fashion also raises concern
Evidence suggests that fashion companies do not
carefully monitor how their clothes are produced,
so consumers can't be sure that their clothes were
not made by exploiting workers. In Britain, many
garment workers are apparently being paid less than
the minimum wage. Abroad, slave labour child labour
and poor working conditions still exist, more than five
years after the collapse of the Rana Plaza complex in
Bangladesh killed around 1.100garment workers.
In recent years, the Waste and Resources Action
Programme (known as WRAP), which works closely
with the fashion industry, has done an excellent job
in promoting longer-lasting clothing.
7. But designing long-lasting garments is useless if
they are thrown away early. Every garment that
is produced has an impact on the environment.
In a sustainable fashion culture, fewer garments
would be produced and, when no longer wearable,
the materials would either be recycled or reused -
for example, through 'upcycling', where unwanted
clothes are redesigned into new items:
It is a vision that still seems very far away. However,
a report by the UK's Environmental Audit Committee
offers hope. It proposes a "producer responsibility"
scheme in which producers would pay a 1p tax per
garment to improve clothing collection and recycling
in order to deal with clothing waste. This strategy
attracted the most attention in the media.
Per
But the report proposes a few other solutions that
could be even more significant, For example, it noted
that Sweden has reduced VAT (value added tax) on
clothing repair services. School lessons on designing.
creating and repairing clothes is another proposition.
Economic and educational solutions are needed
because recycling does not fix the basic problem of
unsustainable levels of production and consumption
in the clothing sector. In short, companies produce
too much and consumers buy too much.
A target to halve consumption of clothes by 2030
would be an appropriate goal to focus people's minds.

1.
What are the advantages of cheap prices in the fashion sector?
2.
What are the disadvantages?
3. Why can't consumers be sure that workers weren't exploited to make their clothes?
4.
What four sustainable solutions are mentioned in the article?
5.
What is the author's proposal for consumers?