The fashion industry’s ugly underbelly

Big brand names continue to deny their responsibility to protect garment workers in poorer countries from exploitation

In our increasingly globalised world, offshoring and outsourcing production is a common phenomenon, including within the garment industry. The sourcing of garments from poorer countries, which have lower production costs, may seem like a win-win situation for everyone. Yet, the garment industry has become notorious for exploiting tens of millions of workers who are slogging away to churn out the diverse range of garments sold by big brand names. The fast fashion industry is particularly problematic given its business model of making profits by keeping production costs as low as possible to maximise sales, rather than charging higher prices for individual items.

Rights-based advocates rightly lament the rise of this highly exploitative fast-fashion industry. Enticed by advertisements and throwaway prices, consumers are encouraged to overhaul their wardrobes each season and buy additional clothing items within a given season. Fast fashion makes good money for brand-names due to frequent sales to consumers on the insatiable hunt for cheaply priced clothing items. Factory owners in poorer countries can also make a decent living by churning out a steady supply of export orders, even if they provide razor-thin profit margins. Someone, however, must pay the price for fast fashion. It is invariably the hapless garment factory workers, often women working on or below minimum wages, who face the brunt of this insatiable demand for fast fashion apparel.

Not only are factory workers being exploited, this exploitation travels down the supply chain to adjoining informal sector workers doing out-of-factory work such as dying fabric or providing accessories for finished clothing items at well below official minimum wage.

The cost of fast fashion is also being borne by the environment. Consider for instance the detrimental impact of continuing to boost cotton supply using already stressed natural resources such as fertile land and freshwater and by applying harmful fertilisers and pesticides. Despite the high ecological cost of producing raw cotton, cheaply priced garments soon end up in landfills as consumers declutter their closets to make room for new clothing items. According to the Clean Clothes Initiative, three out of five of the 100 billion garments made in 2018 were estimated to have ended up in landfills within a year. It should thus come as no surprise that the garment industry is considered one of the largest producers of waste, as well as one of the leading industrial sources of carbon emissions.

A powerful documentary titled, ‘The True Cost’ provides a comprehensive and compelling portrayal of problems associated with the fast fashion industry. There is an adverse chain reaction of consequences linked to the production of cheap clothing. However, it is not only the fast fashion industry where exploitation is rife. The broader garment industry, which also caters to consumers willing to pay higher prices for better quality products, is also quite exploitative.

A significant proportion of garment factory workers do not get regular contracts and are frequently coerced to work overtime. Women, who comprise the bulk of the garment industry workforce, are often deprived of maternity leaves and child-care. Garment factory workers who manage to organise or unionise to demand better working conditions and higher wages are often quashed by local authorities as those at the helm do not want to see a decline in export revenues.

Big brand names continue to deny their responsibility to protect garment workers in poorer countries from various forms of exploitation by either feigning ignorance or by shifting blame to varied intermediaries within their convoluted supply chains. These same big brands have developed all sorts of ingenious quality assurance mechanisms to ensure that their products look and feel the same no matter where they are produced. If the fashion industry can ensure strict compliance with product quality requirements, why can it not assure that the workers who provide raw materials and accessories for their branded garments, and those who work in factories to create finished garment products, be provided basic labour right guarantees?

Published in The Express Tribune, July 22^nd, 2022.

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