Every year, all the neglected clothes that we throw away end up in landfills - contributing to a growing waste issue. When consumers dispose of clothing, it does plenty of harm such as wasting water resources and worsening living conditions. Let's talk about this in-depth and try to understand it better.
Fast fashion plays a huge role in textile waste. It fills the market with affordable and trendy clothes for each and every season. But affordability isn't the issue here. Overconsumption is. The ever-changing fashion trends that pressure consumers to make unnecessary purchases are a part of the problem. These fashion trends lure consumers into buying clothes that they don't actually require. Since the clothes are cheap and easily accessible, consumers don't give a second thought when purchasing them.
You can easily guess that as the trends change, most of the clothes purchased end up being tossed right into the bin. These end up in landfills, taking up to 200+ years to decompose. In 2015, textile waste (mainly discarded clothing and footwear, carpets, sheets, towels, and tires) accounted for 7.6% of all municipal solid waste in landfills; That's 10.5 million tons of textile waste. (EPA 2015).
Needless to say, the fashion industry is the second-largest polluter in the world. For example, let's examine the making of a simple cotton t-shirt. It takes 2,700 litres of water to make ONE single cotton t-shirt. That's 900 days worth of drinking water. Cotton, a natural material, isn't so natural after it goes through the manufacturing process embedded with chemicals and toxins; this process requires tons of water. About 20% of industrial water pollution is due to garment manufacturing (World Resources Institute). Eventually, all of these chemicals end up in water bodies. This harms not only those who live near rivers and lakes for sustenance, but also harms aquatic life.
Apart from unsustainable manufacturing processes, the fashion industry commits a bigger crime: burning their own clothes. Luxury brands, like Burberry, burn billion dollars worth of unsold stock to prevent them from being sold at lower prices. This ensures that their items retain their status of being "luxurious and exclusive". This senseless destruction of perfectly usable merchandise is wasteful. It harms the environment through the emission of harmful gases and micro-plastics into the atmosphere.
Developing countries, like India, serve as havens where clothes are shipped, specifically for the purpose of getting destroyed. Unwanted clothes are sent to these countries to be re-spun into fiber and thread. This might look like a sustainable practice as clothes are being recycled and reused on a surface level. But in reality, the re-spinning of clothes into thread wastes more water and resources than it would have if those clothes were simply donated or sent to thrift stores.
Unfortunately, for the clothes donated to charities, only a meager percentage of it goes into thrift stores that raise money for the needy. The remaining majority of clothes, which are faulty in nature, are sent to poorer countries. where they end up in landfills. Their lack of resources restricts them from effectively managing waste.
This increases environmental and health risks in these countries.
As the clothing decomposes, it emits methane - a greenhouse gas that's more lethal than carbon itself. In simpler words, methane has more heating power than carbon. This speeds up global warming at an alarming rate. Therefore, reducing methane emissions will directly benefit the climate and atmosphere. Even though textile unsustainability is majorly caused by capitalistic brands, there are some ways we can help at an individual level.
There are tons of small things we can do to help tackle this issue.
Avoiding bulk buying from fast fashion stores. Fast fashion's quick production of clothes lures us into buying clothes we might not need.
Ask yourself whether you NEED the clothes you are purchasing. This saves more money and resources than you'd actually think.
Avoid fast fashion brands as much as you can unless you really need something from it.
Try shopping at thrift stores/borrowing clothes/renting clothes.
Learn sewing or find a good tailor to repair torn clothes
Instead of throwing away old clothes, donate them, or give them to a friend.
To play a small role in combating this, Girl Up Emirates has started a sustainable charity thrift store, where proceeds are used to uplift marginalized communities. We sell secondhand clothes, jewellery, and art at affordable prices, out of which 100% of our profits go to charity. Purchasing from us helps to prevent clothes from ending up in landfills, and lets you give to charity indirectly.
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