Potential for sustainable production and consumption

Several companies in the fashion industry have come up with impressive alternatives to the products and services produced by conventional manufactures. Notwithstanding this, there is a fundamental problem exists in trying to measure how these different innovations and alternatives helped to achieve the objectives in sustainable development. In testing for harmful substances in products, these strategies may be deemed to be successful in the mass market. They address the ecological aspect of green fashion adequately by ensuring end products are free from substances that may harm the environment. However, as earlier identified, they have a weakness in not being able to meet the social objective of green fashion. Another thing is that by solely testing the end product, it is not possible to achieve crucial improvements in the production stages. This is because it may be difficult to identify the stage at which the levels of a particular substance become high. In the use of natural textiles, huge achievements can be made. However, the major limitation in this is that though considerable improvements will be made, organic textiles only have a meager market share therefore the effect is largely limited. In the broad sense of sustainable consumption and production, natural textiles help to meet the standards but in the narrow sense of achieving green fashion, they are still deficient.

From a sustainability perspective, though the measures identified help to reduce environmental pollution which can be measured through reduction in carbon emissions, as well as to ensure sustainability, they still require substantial effort in order to achieve the optimum levels while maintaining and developing fashion trends. In addition to this, studies that have been conducted on the significance of ecological and social considerations to fashion show that consumers hardly care about how sustainability comes into fashion

. One of the major reasons behind this is that consumers have extreme difficulty finding information about the sustainability of the manufacturers since the latter lack transparency.

Conclusion

The justification for textile and clothing manufacturers to shift towards sustainability shows this is supported by many advantages. However, it is necessary that the strategies adopted cascade all the way down to the most basic raw materials that the manufacturer uses. Cotton and polyester are the most predominant textiles used and the former is a highly water and pesticide intensive crop. Additionally, the adoption of organic cotton shows that its market share is still meager despite clothing giants promoting measurable improvements in key ecological and social aspects of production

Other strategies have also been adopted as companies try to align themselves with the rise of eco-couture. These include ecological improvements to textiles and clothing and testing for harmful substances. Though these have their own advantages and disadvantages, their adoption is still minimal which makes it hard to reduce the overall carbon footprint of the fashion industry as a whole.

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