The Fashion Industry’s Impact on Climate Change is a Women’s Rights Issue
By Sofia Karalekas
Every March, the fashion industry floods our feeds with ad campaigns celebrating International Women’s Day – limited-edition collections, pink-washed clothing lines, and slogans of empowerment stitched into every garment. But behind the glossy marketing lies a troubling contradiction.
There is a clear paradox of fashion companies using social and environmental justice concerns to market products that are made under conditions of climate injustice and the exploitation of women. These companies claim to support feminism, endorse sustainability, and champion human rights—strategies known as “fem-washing” and “green-washing”—yet they continue to source their garments from opaque overseas supply chains, largely manufacturing their products in factories that operate unethically.
The fashion industry’s unethical operations are nothing new. In the 1980s and 1990s, changes in the international geopolitical landscape and the globalization of technology catalyzed the industry’s ethical and environmental decline, as fashion brands in the West gradually began shifting their production to Asia to take advantage of the cheaper cost of labor. While this lowered costs for consumers, the negative environmental and social impacts have been felt deeply worldwide, from the enormous strain on global resources to the large-scale mistreatment of garment workers.
From an environmental standpoint, the fashion industry is one of the highest polluting industries in the world. The European Environment Agency classifies it as the industry with the fifth highest greenhouse gas emissions, with its global supply chains emitting about 5% of the planet’s total greenhouse gas emissions. Global fashion supply chains are estimated to pump out over 1.2 billion tons of carbon dioxide (or CO2 equivalents) into the atmosphere each year, supercharging the natural greenhouse effect and causing global temperatures to rise. Moreover, the industry is rapidly contributing to a large-scale increase in resource scarcity and land degradation. Water pollution and usage are also of immense concern. The industry consumed 93 billion cubic meters of water in 2015 alone, and textile production is estimated to be responsible for 20% of global clean water pollution. While fashion often earns itself a more “frivolous” rhetoric compared to other highly polluting industries, it is evident that the fashion industry significantly contributes to climate change.
The catastrophic impact of the fashion industry on climate change and the environment is inherently a women’s rights issue. Women and girls experience the greatest impacts of climate change. Looking to the agriculture sector, women depend more on natural resources but have less access to them. Agriculture is the most important employment sector for women across low-middle-income countries, and in many regions, women bear a disproportionate responsibility for securing food and water. The fashion industry’s effect on land degradation and water pollution thus tangentially affects the livelihoods of millions of women globally by being a primary driver of these issues. Moreover, the industry’s massive greenhouse gas emissions contribute to periods of drought and erratic rainfall that come along with climate change, forcing women to work harder to secure their income and resources for their families.
It is also crucial to note that globally, 60% of garment workers are women. In Asia, where most of fashion manufacturing and production for western nations is outsourced, women account for approximately 42 million of the region’s garment workers. These women often face unsafe working conditions, long hours without compensation, and in extreme cases, physical abuse and sexual harassment within garment factories. As the primary workers in these factories, these women are also immediately affected when the fashion industry’s unsustainable practices inevitably spill over into their local communities. For instance, many communities in Bangladesh, particularly those along the Buriganga River, have been deeply impacted by untreated wastewater discharge from garment factories. The presence of heavy metals and pollutants in the river has introduced a variety of health issues for women living along the riverbanks, namely chronic bronchitis and asthma , along with destroying a freshwater ecosystem that women disproportionately rely on for water collection. Additionally, a key factor of rising greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere is the impact of climate change on river quality, further exacerbating heavy metal fluctuations and decimating a water source women rely on.
So, who is ultimately responsible for holding the fashion industry accountable? Should the burden fall on consumers or corporations? And, perhaps even more difficult to answer, where do we start? For those of us who can, in the spirit of Women’s History Month, it is time to speak up on behalf of the millions of women who face injustice at the hands of the clothing labels we wear every day. But more notably, the fashion industry must step outside the bounds of performative activism and take real steps towards ethical and sustainable practices to protect women globally, starting with stricter environmental regulations. The time has come for the fashion industry to choose between surface-level marketing and genuine transformation—by committing to ethical practices that uplift women and the planet, they can turn their words into meaningful action.
Sofia Karalekas is a MALD student at The Fletcher School, Tufts University