Introduction
For many years, the global textile industry has been an enormous blot on the ethicallandscape. The size and scale of it is hard for anyone to comprehend. Millions toil makingclothing in unholy conditions for extremely low pay. Many more work the cotton fields,picking and processing the heavily-sprayed cotton crop for a pittance. Once it has been usedby our disposable British culture, most of this labour-intensive product is turned into a wasteproblem in a landfill site. And it is truly a waste – a waste of millions of lives, a wasteof resources to make and fuel to transport the finished products around the world and atoxic waste gift to future generations.In the UK, much has been made of the Organic and Fairtrade movements, with certainsectors of the textile industry racing to embrace the profits of being 'ethical' and 'green'.Whilst in some ways these are positive developments, it translates into very slight ripples inthe global textile industry sea. However much we might try to hide from the reality, thesystem requires a pool of poorly paid people to produce items in poor countries to feed ourendless appetite for new clothing. Fairtrade certainly makes a slight income difference topeople in a small part of the supply chain, but can never force meaningful changesthroughout the system because consumers would never pay for it. Often a major part of theattraction for the large brands is that they can sell the items at a premium which is out of proportion to the extra production costs involved. It also does nothing to address thewanton destructive force of the global textile industry. We fool ourselves into believing thata few extra pennies to the producer does anything more than paper over the cracks that wewould rather not think about.
We have to reinvent the processso it provides for our clothingneeds in a sustainable future
At some point we have to rethink fashion. We have to reinvent the process so that it provides for ourclothing needs in a sustainable future. In this paper, we will argue that there is an alternative whichfew have so far examined. We will further argue that the answers lie in front of us and that themoral imperative is within us and not in some distant forgettable land.
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