Eco Fashion in Supply Chains

The garment industry needs to develop products which take account of the social and environmental impact of the industry, such as those using natural materials, in order to offer consumers products in accord with the principle of social responsibility.

The textile industry has caused environmental problems to deepen due to the indiscriminate generation of industrial waste. Tonnes of garments after use are discarded and left as waste in most developed societies. An immense amount of textile industry products have accumulated due to the simplification of production processes, and pollution expands at the pace of fashion throughout the world. With the growth of ethical conscience and respect for the environment, and in order to achieve improvements in quality of life, an ecological balance must guide the production of fibres, yarns and fabrics. Textile products can make a substantial contribution to increasing quality of life, particularly through products related to the safety and protection of people’s lives. However, most garments are not currently biodegradable and do not contribute to caring for the planet. Therefore, the garment industry needs to develop products which take account of the social and environmental impact of the industry, such as those using natural materials, in order to offer consumers products in accord with the principle of social responsibility.

1. Introduction

     Moreover, fashion exerts different pressures throughout the world which are manifested both in society and the individual. This results in a conflict between development and the constant acceleration of production caused by individualistic consumption and the growing ecological awareness spreading across different sectors of the economy. The life cycle of the fashion clothing industry is illustrated in Figure 1. The textile and fashion industry is one of the largest in the world, employing one sixth of the world’s working population. After agriculture, this sector uses more water than any other. It emits toxic chemical agents, uses enormous amounts of energy and is one of the main industries responsible for global warming. Hence, it is important to consider its negative impacts and to discover solutions to them through the so called 3Rs (reuse, reduce, and recycle) which can adapt the industrial processes of the textile industry and the life cycle of its products into a more socially responsible corporate supply chain.

Figure 1: The life cycle of the fashion clothing industry.

1. 1. The 3Rs

As illustrated in Figure 1, the 3Rsrelate to different strategies aimed at decreasing the flow of new materials in an economic system. The aim of reusing, reducing, and recycling products is to prevent or postpone the disposal of used products in landfills etc., so that the resources used in their production can be returned to the economic system either by reusing or reducing them or by allowing them to be recycled as raw materials in an industrial process.

Reuse has been a long-standing stage in the life-cycle of garments and is as old as the industry itself. However, reuse activities vary according to the growth of consumption, expulsion and the influence of economic markets. Moreover, there are many routes available for reusing garments, which promise different opportunities to create a socially responsible corporate supply chain. The most obvious is the direct route in which second-hand clothes that are of good quality and in good condition are acquired by mediators and resold locally as vintage clothing at thrift stores, charity shops or secondhand fairs. This route produces employment and extends the life of garments, thus saving resources. However, not all reused clothes are disposed of locally and many are sent to used-clothing markets in different countries. The mediators facilitating the reuse of garments are generally charities or waste disposal companies who obtain the garments either through collection or donation from their original users. They have little control over the customs of the eventual users or the condition of the garment that they obtain by way of collection or donation and there has been a tendency to limit the amount of clothing supplied and its quality in order to increase profits. However, these methods of reuse will collapse unless the industry modifies its posture relating to waste processing and the value assigned to the materials both used or without previous use. It would be preferable if the eventual recovery of the garments formed an active part of the integral development of fashion.

The goal of reduce is to give life to discarded or damaged garments as a way of preventing them from being dumped or postponing that situation for as long as possible. There are abundant and diverse procedures to restore used, unwanted or damaged clothes to a usable condition, and nowadays a number of designers are working with recycled clothing to create new products, which fuse the recycling of used textiles with creativity and ornament. In this way, they manage to invent unique creations by redesigning, and disassembling garments and manufacturing new garments or parts of them with the assistance of technology. These innovations can result in both a tendency for the reduction of the cost of the raw materials used as well as the possibility that the end product will have a value higher than the original product from which it was derived, a phenomenon known as up-cycling or supra-recycling. The virtues of reduce are indisputable: new clothes are made from used or unwanted clothes, which reduce the wasting of the resources that were used to make the original textile material by simply discarding them. Further, the reduce of used or unwanted clothes also creates new sources of employment. Reducing is an occupation that demands both effort and the development of skills among the labour force employed, as well as the input of varied raw materials, which are mainly derived from what would otherwise be regarded as waste. Manufacturers in many countries have exploited the potential of reducing to create outstanding brands and have produced large quantities of exclusive and handmade clothes.

Currently, the challenge is for them to use as much waste as possible in their products. The imagination and talent devoted to producing new garments through reduce represents a more sustainable archetype for commerce in the world of fashion. In addition, there is now the possibility of developing recycling techniques involving the recovery of the fibres in fabrics through chemical or mechanical processes. Chemical procedures can only be carried out with synthetic fibres while natural fibres of all kinds can be recovered using mechanical procedures.

Formerly, such recycled materials were transformed into blankets and woollen coats but nowadays they can also be transformed into mattresses or insulating materials. Mechanical recycling enables considerable savings in the use of new material and consumes less energy and if the materials are divided into different colours and treated in colour batches which also reduces water consumption. Synthetic materials can also be recycled using mechanical techniques and the most common example of such a technique is the recycling of plastic bottles using the PET (Polyethylene Terephthalate) system, in the same way, fibres from waste synthetic textiles can be recovered and recycled. This includes the recycling of polyester by chemical alteration of the polyester polymer into the monomers constituting the polyester. These are then polymerised again in order to obtain a better-quality material than can be achieved by mechanical procedures alone. The recycling of polyester, either by mechanical or chemical means is becoming very important. Currently in Europe, most polyester fibres are obtained from recycled sources derived using the latest technologies. This results in a great saving of energy equivalent annually to the consumption of around 100,000 people. Additionally, there are considerable environmental benefits as well as social benefits to thousands of people and the supply of PET to textile industries can be achieved through alliances with distributors who specialise in recycling.

The recycling of fibres results in a great saving of resources and should become a routine part of the relationship between textile designers, producers and recyclers. However, there is currently a lack of communication and recyclers have not signalled the need for changes in production processes prior to the manufacture of garments, to both producers and designers, who therefore fail to produce products that favour recycling.

Therefore, there has been little global consideration given by the members of the fashion sector, in which the priority has been to ensure that fashion fits perfectly with the demands created by the consumer society.

1.2. The consumer society: Its actions and consequences

The level of consumption in more developed countries has become excessive and environmentally harmful, not only because more vital natural resources, which cannot be easily renewed, are consumed, but also because societies are not well prepared to be able to reverse the critical impacts on the environment, which will have irreversible consequences on the planet. Therefore, there is an urgent need to transform consumption habits and the production processes by which society’s requirements and those of their populations are met. Whilst there are many campaigns and other strategies aimed at raising awareness of environmental issues among consumers, these often do not affect consumer behaviour nor how well-informed consumers are. Moreover, it is the socially elite stratum which is to a large extent the destination of business returns. Thus, being fashionable represents a form of aspirational behaviour for the masses and in its most inventive interpretation is one of the most powerful and spontaneous statements of personal desire and the wish to belong to a place or social class. However, fashion contributes to social and environmental degradation through momentary tendencies and invasive advertising that use and take advantage of the congenital needs of incorporation and difference to hasten sales periods and encourage a constant increase in production.

Presently, the way in which clothing design is practiced, thrives in these conditions of social inequality but does not encourage corporate social responsible (CSR) since it is fully incorporated into the market and calculates its success in terms of increased sales and profits. The illusion that more is constantly needed is based on the assumption that the public continually wants more, and companies impose their business ethic to feed the public’s aspiration to consume more in order to sustain their commercial agenda of maximising returns. In fashion, the main generators of this economic increase are women since women`s clothing represents the largest percentage of the global fashion industry.

1.3. Pollution by the textile industry

The textile industry, in which large volumes of chemicals and reagents are used, is one of the largest collaborators in the pollution of the environment due to the amount of waste it produces, leading to air and water pollution near to production plants. Some of the main sources of atmospheric and effluent emissions caused by the textile industry have been identified.

The textile manufacturing industry includes various processes such as sizing, dyeing, and other finished product processes. The most important problem results from chemicals being directly discharged into water bodies, thus triggering water pollution, which affects both human beings and animals, particularly aquatic animals.

1.4. Atmospheric emissions

 The atmospheric emissions produced by the textile industry generally arise from the finishing process from the drying and condensation machines. While heating textiles, these generate oil mists, which include oils, plasticisers, and materials which degrade on exposure to heat. Further, waste produced during the preparation of fibres and their oxidation products produce emissions during weaving. Furthermore, in the heat setting process of resins at high temperatures, vapours of organic compounds are generated and there are also acidic mists that occur during the carbonisation of wool and in some types of spray dye. The solvent vapours generated contain a high number of toxic compounds in different concentrations, which vary depending on the chemical products used during dyeing and finishing. Some of these chemical compounds are preserved in the fibres and then evaporate in the dryers. The emission of ammonia compounds occurs during the stamping process, since these compounds are contained in the pastes which are used in stamping.

Moreover, various powders are produced in the spinning of natural and synthetic fibres and on a smaller scale, almost all textile processes cause dust. Dust alone is not a contaminant, but its appearance can hinder the removal of other compounds. Most textile plants are equipped with fi litres which are used to trap barely-visible light dust and heavy fumes. In addition, factories use electrostatic precipitators, which are suitable for the entrapment of fi ne dust, light smoke and micro-atmospheric impurities, and air sterilisers are used to eliminate bacteria.

1.5. Global warming potential and incineration systems

The energy recovered by incinerating textile waste, can be used to replace other sources of heat and can also be used as a source of energy to generate electricity. Incineration is the current means of waste treatment used for energy recovery in many countries and the amount of heat and electricityproduced which replaces heat and electricity generated from other energy sources, affects the total environmental impact of the production system. Figure 3 shows the global warming potential per tonne of treated textile waste based on the whole production system. It is observed that the total performance of the incineration system in terms of global warming potential and primary energy usage are illustrated. The thermal energy used for the heating supply is based on heat generated from natural gas. As can be seen the most significant contributor to the global warming potential is the incineration step. The total value of the global warming potential is equal to 230 kg CO2 per tonne of textile waste. The increasing population and the rising standards of living will continue to expand this problem in the future.

The results for primary energy demand in each step of the incineration system, has been determined. It has been observed that a large amount of energy is recovered by incinerating the collected textile waste. The amount of energy required for the incineration system is insignificant compared to the amount of energy recovered by the system.

1.6. The CSR challenges in eco-fashion design and the fashion industry

 In general, the fashion industry is facing great challenges in the area of CSR. As a labour-intensive industry, it needs to show care for its employees’ health and the safety of the conditions they work in, not only within individual companies, but also along their supply chain. Cooperation with suppliers and retailers is increasingly important and the supply chain management processes therefore play a major role in the apparel industry. Further, as a resource-intensive sector, it needs to compensate for using the planets’ natural resources and mitigate the damage it causes to the natural environment. The textile and clothing industry use a lot of resources during production, and it is therefore important to handle waste efficiently and diminish environmental impact. All those aspects make the sector very interesting from a CSR perspective and show that there is the potential for further development towards a socially responsible corporate supply chain. Fashion typically combines the finest materials and top designers seek to create products which every consumer desires. Nevertheless, when people consider the environmental effects that fashion creates, the social responsibility of the fashion industry becomes a major issue. Even high-end consumers have changed from pursuing name-brands and designer fashions to brands that can bring a sustainable approach to the design and manufacture of modern clothing. What is interesting is that fashion brands are not devalued by being socially sustainable and producing clothing and fashion accessories from recycled materials. Consumers may even identify these environmentally responsible brands with their own sense of social responsibility.

With higher levels of consumer social and environmental consciousness, fashion brands must inevitably show that they care about the planet as much as their consumers do in order to address the issues involved.

The impact of the consumer society and its relationship with the environment and particularly the responsible use of nonrenewable resources represent a challenge for the textile industry. Most garments that are currently produced for consumption are not designed with the intention of reducing the environmental impact of their production and their disposal thus threatens to upset the balance of nature and society as well.

Regrettably, even though there are so many examples of ethical fashion, it is still not easy for the public to buy clothes or bags made from recycled materials that are traded fairly. Consumer consciousness has been changed. Formerly, people simply required a product without any faults but nowadays, that is not enough. People now want a perfect product that has had no adverse side effects. Global apprehensions regarding climate change are inspiring many people to reduce their ecological footprints. People want an ideal product that has no side effects, no defects and is eco-friendly while ensuring proper CSR practice. Consumer beliefs about ethical fashion influence the fashion industry socially and environmentally and integrating environmental and social sustainability related practices into the fashion industry business is more important than in other industries. The CSR movement will benefit the fashion industry and contribute towards the healthy growth of local economies and the development of communities as well contributing to the creation of a sustainable global textile supply chain. The link between CSR and competitiveness is stronger in terms of benefits to the environment and communities achieved throughout the supply chain involving both suppliers and consumers. Transparency in the supply chain and the integration of sustainability act as drivers of change in the textile industry from both a social and environmental perspective.

At this point in time, the application of social life cycle assessment would be very beneficial for companies with the best social performance, in terms of their employing sustainable means of production and distribution. CSR behaviour and sustainable practices lead to decision making in the fashion industry which are beneficial to the broader issue of creating sustainable economic systems. However, aspects of supply chain relationship management may be more critical in progressing the implementation of CSR. While CSR represents a rising focus of corporate governance, there are many barriers to its implementation. However, there has been much research attention devoted to the practice of CSR in the textile industry, which has noted the benefits of CSR, not only for the industry, but also for the community and environment. Nevertheless, there is currently only a limited focus within the fashion industry on eco-fashion designing and CSR practices throughout the supply chain. However, it is eco fashion designers who are best placed to take valuable steps towards creating a more sustainable supply chain through the application of ecologically beneficial processes, options and innovations in the production of textile goods.

 This study will consider the different eco-friendly opportunities that currently exist, ranging from manufacturing processes to the final product and the role of the designer in the fashion industry. An overview of the different waste and contaminants that may arise in the manufacturing processes will be presented. Finally, the study will reflect on the activity of eco conscious designers and their commitment to developing a sustainable fashion supply chain. The new challenge for the creators of fashion is not only to innovate morphologically but also to incorporate sustainability in their designs. This could play an important and fundamental role in tackling the issue of environmental pollution caused by the fashion industry and form the focus of a socially responsible corporate supply chain.

About the author:

• Dr N Gokarneshan is from the Department of Textile Chemistry, SSM College of Engineering, Komarapalayam, Tamil Nadu.
• Dr U Ratna is from Department of Textiles and Clothing, Avinashilingam Institute of Home Science and Higher education of Women, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu.
• Dr D Anita Rachelis from theDepartment of Fashion Design, Footwear Design and Development  Institute, Noida, Uttar Pradesh.
• Sona M Anton and Z Shahanaz are from the Department of Fashion Design and Arts, Hindustan Institute of Technology and Science, Chennai, Tamil Nadu.
• B Padma and R Hari Priya are from the Department of Costume Design and Fashion, Dr.SNS Rajalakshmi College of Arts and Science, Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu.