LAW SOCIETY

FASHION IMPACT ON CLIMATE CHANGE

By Bojana Bogojevic

Every year, on the fourth Friday in November, an unusual discount is organized all over the world: The well-known Black Friday.

History of Black Friday

At the end of the 19 th century, the then American president, Abraham Lincoln, named the last Thursday in November a national holiday, Thanksgiving. On the first Friday after Thanksgiving, the biggest shopping activities start and the most profitable days for traders come.

As the sellers wanted the previously realized large income to be repeated from year to year, they came up with the idea to call that day a holiday of shopping. That’s how Black Friday came to be – the first Friday after Thanksgiving.

I assure you our planet is in desperate need to green Friday.

BOJANA BOGOJEVIC

What about FASHION FOOTPRINT?

The clothes we all buy and wear have very often to majority of consumers unknown ecological and social footprint. but the good news is, it is avoidable.

It is highly important to understand how your simplest T- shirt can cause a huge environmental impact by generating big amounts of CO2.

Fashion became a huge enemy to climate change.

We are already facing draught ad it’s consequences but what about information that for producing simplest shirt of 250grams it is estimated we need about 2,900 litres of water, and for cotton bud ( which are unhealthy to use according to otolaryngologists) we need 4 litres.

Are you surprised?

I was. I was very proud I stopped using cotton buds long ago according to medical advice of specialist mentioned above.

The scariest information is that every single stage of the production process creates amount of waste.

If we want to contribute to sustainable fashion we shall avoid fast fashion.

According to UNCTAD around 93 billion cubic metres of water , which for your information is enough to meet the needs of five million people - is used by the fashion industry annually, and around half a million tons of microfibre, which is the equivalent of 3 million barrels of oil, is now being dumped into the ocean every year.

Pollution doesn’t end at the factory. As it is mentioned above every single stage of the production process adds to pollution. Fashion industry is responsible for more than all international flights and maritime shipping combined.

Please do calculate and learn your fashion footprint : https://www.fashionfootprint.org/

If we want to help our planet in fight against climate change consumers and fashion companies must act together.

We always have to have on our mind this :

• 2,000 gallons of water needed to make one pair of jeans;

• 93 billion cubic metres of water, enough for 5 million people to survive, is used by the fashion industry every year;

• Fashion industry produces 20 % of global wastewater;

• Clothing and footwear production is responsible for 8% of global greenhouse gas emissions;

• Every second, the equivalent of one garbage truck of textiles is landfilled or burned.

Remember over-consumptiot slowly but surely leads to extinction.

It is important to know, where majority see waste there is environmentally sustainable business to others.

So, before you next buy think carefully. Our single act can contribute to climate change. We shall avoid buying on a whim and buy responsibly. Our planet needs every act of our help. New pair of jeans can be bought even in secondhand store. There is no shame in reusing old things we all have in our wardrobe. Almost everything can have a new purpose. We can do it wisely and you will see it is very buget friendly.