Fast fashion is the practice of fashion brands producing more collections at a quicker pace. The clothes are often lower-priced, and the turnarounds are quicker. This method of production is a way for fashion brands to maximize profit and keep on trend while meeting consumer demand that is continuously evolving. Major fashion brands like H&M and Zara have adopted fast fashion and seen tremendous growth in their profits. However, this method of production makes one wonder whether these profits are worth it. Fast fashion brings with it a lot of negative impact on people, the industry and the environment.

Overproduction and overconsumption of fast fashion has led to increased environmental waste as a lot of the fabrics used in the production are cheap, non-disposable fabrics. The pace and amount at which the garments are being produced is way too high leading to excessive waste. If a fashion brand is coming up with collections every two weeks, then the previous collection of garments that have not yet been sold are disposed of every two weeks to make way for the new collection in stores. Even if the fabrics were disposable this fast pace of throwing away of ‘old’ clothes doesn’t give the environment enough time for the fabrics to decompose. In the short run, this business model may look appealing to fashion brands and customers. However, in the long run it is environmentally unsustainable and leads to environmental pollution. The ‘old’ clothes are usually shipped to less-developed countries in Africa where they are sold as second-hand clothes or are shipped to less-developed Asian countries like Bangladesh where they are disposed of.

The second-hand clothing industry has become a prominent and profitable industry in the African fashion markets. A lot of Africans may see the fashion trends associated with westernized clothing and want to be a part of the trend. However, many Africans usually can’t afford to shop from stores like H&M. The second-hand clothing industry has made it possible for a lot of Africans to get a hold of westernized ‘trendy’ clothing at a much cheaper rate. A lot of the time these second-hand clothes are usually new or worn only once or twice and still in good condition. They are usually part of the old collections that were unable to sell in Europe and have thus been shipped to Africa. The positive impact of this industry is that these clothes are sold at a mere fraction of their original prices affording a lot of Africans the opportunity to shop for the latest trendy clothing. However, the second-hand clothing industry is killing the local garment production industry in Africa. Local designers are finding it extremely hard to make turnarounds and profits as their customers are constantly complaining about why their garments are ‘expensive’. They are used to the low prices of second-hand clothing and may feel ripped off by the various prices local designers charge. What the customers don’t understand is that the real cost of garment production is quite high. Local designers that are producing the garments locally have to pay their garment workers reasonable wages, invest in good quality African fabric and cover other related costs. Big fashion brands in Europe are spending less money on the cost of production as they outsource garment production to less-developed countries like Bangladesh where cost of labour is extremely cheap. The profits they can make are therefore much higher than those that local African designers make. Even with them disposing a lot of the clothes in dumping sites and in the second-hand clothing industry their turnarounds are still incredibly high!

Garment production is one of the world’s biggest and most labour-intensive manufacturing industries. Most of the garments sold in Europe are produced in Asian countries where labour is extremely cheap and environmental governance is poor. An example of such a country where you’ll find many garment workers is Bangladesh. Workers work long hours for poverty wages and in conditions that often breach Occupational Health and Safety Standards. The continued downward price pressure by companies keeps their wages low. The wages of most garment workers are often no higher than the level of minimum wage in their country, which is often too low to sustain themselves. Excessive working hours are a continuous problem. Garment workers work overtime to make a bit of extra cash which is still often not enough to meet basic needs. Poor working conditions hit the headlines on 24 April 2013 when Rana Plaza building, in Bangladesh collapsed. The building housed 5 garment factories where over 1000 people died and over 2000 were badly injured. The victims were mostly young women.

How much more are women to suffer in this industry doing the ground work while the CEOs of major fashion retailers, who are mostly men, continue to make large amounts of profit? The documentary movie, The True Cost, highlights the struggles that women go through being garment workers in poor working conditions and living in poverty while those at the top of the fashion industry are living lavish lifestyles and making insane amounts of profit. The fashion industry is a highly profitable industry with only a small percentage of those working in it really benefitting from the high profits. This needs to change. For us to live in an environmentally sustainable world, we as fashion brands need to be more socially aware and compliant of basic human rights.