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THE STATE OF THE INDUSTRY A IT’S TIME FOR A FASHION REVOLUTION WHITE PAPER DECEMBER 2015 FASHION REVOLUTION | IT’S TIME FOR A FASHION REVOLUTION 1 CREDITS CONTENTS Written by Sarah Ditty with special thanks 02 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY for words from Lucy Siegle and research support from Emilie Schultz and 04 WHY DO WE NEED A fashion REvolution? Carry Somers. Acknowledgements: Thanks to Maher Anjum, Sass Brown, 06 MoDEL: THE BUSINESS OF fashion Becky Earley and Mo Tomaney for their invaluable input and feedback. 08 MatERIAL: PEOPLE AND PLANET Designed by Heather Knight 16 MinDSET: SHIFTING THE waY WE THINK ABOUT fashion www.fashionrevolution.org 18 WE ARE THE Fashion REvolution The content of this publication can in no way 20 WHO MADE MY ClothES? THE FOCUS THROUGH 2020 be taken to reflect the views of the European Union, Concord Alliance, C&A Foundation or 21 OUR THEORY OF CHANGE any of the funders of Fashion Revolution. 22 What Fashion REvolution DOES © Fashion Revolution CIC 2015. 24 What MAKES Fashion REvolution UNIQUE All rights reserved. This document is not to be copied or adapted without permission 25 AREas FOR FURTHER RESEARCH & THOUGHT from Fashion Revolution CIC. 26 FINAL woRDS... 27 APPENDIX 28 REFERENCES FASHION REVOLUTION | IT’S TIME FOR A FASHION REVOLUTION 2 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY 3 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY In the two years since this tragedy, tens of thousands of people have taken to social media, to the streets, to their It has been more schools and to halls of government to uncover the stories behind the things we wear. We are Fashion Revolution. than two years since We want to understand and demolish exploitation in the the Rana Plaza fashion industry. However, most of the public is still not aware that human factory collapse and environmental abuses are endemic across the fashion industry and that what they’re wearing could have been made in an exploitative way. We don’t want to wear that story killed and injured anymore. We want to see fashion become a force for good. thousands of This white paper is for people who don’t know that much about the human rights and environmental issues behind garment workers, fashion but want to know more. It is for those who may have participated in the #whomademyclothes hashtag people who were campaign but want to dig a bit deeper. This paper is intended to be diagnostic, setting out why a fashion making clothing revolution is needed now. for dozens of This paper aims to contextualise Fashion Revolution’s efforts. We hope it helps you better understand what Fashion multinational Revolution is, our philosophy, what sort of change we expect to see, and what we’re asking the public, the industry and brands and retailers. other stakeholders to do about it. FASHION REVOLUTION | IT’S TIME FOR A FASHION REVOLUTION 4 WHY DO WE NEED A fashion REvolution? 5 WHY DO WE NEED A FASHION REVOLUTION? On 24 April 2013, over Though the Rana Plaza disaster is no longer on the The Rana Plaza 1,130 people were killed front pages of the news or at the forefront of our minds, we believe it has opened up a window for disaster acted when the Rana Plaza factory significant change in the industry. Whilst this tragedy complex collapsed in Dhaka, is a symptom of industry-wide problems, it gives us as a metaphorical an opportunity to set a new agenda to overcome the Bangladesh. 2,500 more were causes. The public must be part of setting this new call to arms. injured. The people crushed agenda for the fashion industry. However, change under those eight floors were will need to come from multiple angles — business, working for familiar fashion consumers, governments, academia, NGOs and others coming together to create a safer, cleaner, brands in one of the many more just and fair future for fashion. negligent accidents that plague the garment industry. Before we set out what changes need to happen, let us first look broadly at the the way in which our clothing is made today, how it came to be made in Fashion Revolution was born on the day that this manner and what big problems have resulted Rana Plaza collapsed. This disaster acted as a from the way the fashion industry works. metaphorical call to arms. 1,130 is too many people to lose from the planet in one factory, on one We wanted to put a wide lens on the issues below, terrible day without that standing for something. so you have an overview of what we’re talking We believe that the cost of fashion shouldn’t be about when we say we need a fashion revolution. someone’s life. We mustn’t allow tragedies like Though, of course, this doesn’t cover everything. Rana Plaza to remain an unfortunate reality of There are many organisations that have been contemporary life. Today, both people and the working on these issues for years and have made environment are still suffering as a result of how some important in-roads into improving conditions fashion is made, sourced and purchased. We and solving some of the problems that the fashion believe enough is enough. industry faces. There is also a long list of multi- stakeholder groups and government interventions that have paved the way for Fashion Revolution’s work, without which it would be impossible to contextualise the Rana Plaza disaster, many of which you will find listed at the end of this paper. Photography by Jaber Al Nahian, Asitimes and Sharat Chowdhury and Sharat Asitimes Al Nahian, Jaber by Photography FASHION REVOLUTION | IT’S TIME FOR A FASHION REVOLUTION 6 MODEL: THE BUSINESS OF fashion 7 MODEL: THE BUSINESS OF FASHION However, it drove up domestic manufacturing costs Fashion is now one of the most labour intensive However, writer and radio journalist Kurt Anderson Fashion is our chosen skin. and production began moving abroad. By the mid industries, directly employing at least 60 million writes about the history of fashion in Vanity Fair: On an individual level it 1970’s many brands, some of which are now the world’s people (ILO 2015) and likely more than double that “I’ve been a big believer in historical pendulum represents how we feel about biggest retailers, began rapidly copying catwalk styles, indirectly dependent on the sector — an estimated swings—American sociopolitical cycles tend to last, producing them for much less and having them on 80 million in China alone (ODI, 2008). Handicraft according to historians, about 30 years.” So maybe ourselves and what we want to shopping rails within weeks. “Fast fashion” gained artisan production is attributed as the second the time for a fashion revolution really is now. We’ve tell the world about who we are. steam throughout the 1980s, and some heralded it as largest employer across developing countries, seen thirty years of rapid development and now it On a community level, it tells a the “democratisation of fashion.” What once seemed counting some 34 million handicraft artisans may be time for a different model. exclusive to a few was made accessible to most. The just in India. (Alliance for Artisan Enterprise, 2014; story about our history, culture majority of the market moved in this direction. Business of Fashion, 2014). Women represent the and social customs. overwhelming majority of today’s garment workers In 2005, the quota system was eliminated and and artisans. The fashion industry replaced by a World Trade Organisation agreement fundamentally We have worn clothing pretty much from the that effectively opened the floodgates to outsource There are also millions of farmers, dyers, beginning of time, but fashion was not always made abroad. By the mid 2000s, fashion had become a knitters, weavers, and myriad others involved operates in an and consumed the way it is now. Mass-produced huge global business with production constantly in the production and sale of clothing. Fairtrade clothing has existed since the mid nineteenth century moving to countries that offered the lowest wages, the Foundation estimates that as many as 100 million unsustainable way and working conditions have been a problem for least regulation and the least protections for workers households are directly engaged in cotton well over a hundred years. The term “sweatshop’ was and the environment in order to keep up the system production and that 300 million people work in and cannot carry on coined as early as the 1850’s. The Triangle Shirtwaist of producing more for less as quickly as possible. This the cotton sector in total (when you count family Factory fire in 1911 was the deadliest industrial is the case not just for the high street but for luxury labour, farm labour and workers in related services business as usual. disaster of its time, killing 123 women and 23 men in fashion too. such as transportation, ginning, baling and storage). Manhattan, New York City. Mill fires in the UK were so common that mill owners often had their own steam Fast forward to today and the fashion industry is now For the past decade, apparel companies have seen fire engines. one of the most influential sectors, both in terms rising costs, driven by rising labour, raw material and of financial power and how it shapes wider trends, energy prices. Yet despite the higher cost of making However, the way fashion is produced and consumed beliefs, attitudes, behaviours, identity and culture. clothing, the price consumers pay is cheaper than has been dramatically scaled and sped up in the last The global fashion industry (which includes clothing, ever before.
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