The Hot or Cool Institute and the Rapid Transition Alliance recently launched the ‘Unfit, Unfair, Unfashionable: Resizing fashion for a fair consumption space’ report. The report analyses the carbon footprints of different income groups within the G20 countries which include high-income countries like Australia, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Saudi Arabia, South Korea, the UK and the United States, upper middle-income countries like Argentina, Brazil, China, Mexico, the Russian Federation, South Africa and Turkey as well as middle-income countries like India and Indonesia. Apart from highlighting how fashion lifestyles impact climate change, the report also takes into account the target of the Paris Agreement which aims at keeping the average global temperature rise below 1.5 degrees Celsius.
As per the report, fashion consumption is highly unequal between as well as within countries. While the richest 20 per cent in the UK emit 83 per cent above the 1.5-target of fashion consumption, 74 per cent of people in Indonesia live below sufficiency consumption levels of fashion. The report further suggests that G20 high-income countries need to reduce fashion footprints by an average of 60 per cent by 2030, while upper-middle-income countries need to reduce the same by over 40 per cent. Furthermore, fashion consumption of the richest 20 per cent contributes to 20 times higher emissions that the poorest 20 per cent, on average.
As the report highlights the difference between the consumption and footprints between different income groups and countries, the contrast is clearer than ever even as the poor are often blamed for buying cheap clothes. The report suggests that reducing purchases of new clothes can prove to be most effective in reducing the carbon footprint of fashion consumption. Furthermore, actions like repairing/mending, washing at lower temperatures, or buying second-hand are crucial to reducing overall fashion footprints. The report suggests that limiting purchases of new garments to an average of five items per year can help to achieve consumption levels in line with the 1.5-degree target.
Image used for representational purposes only.