Capitalism produces waste – billions and billions of tons of waste every year – with nearly all of that unloaded from the Global North to the Global South.
No one knows exactly how many coats, jeans, T-shirts, and trainers are produced every year, which means no one knows how many garments remain unsold in warehouses, destined for landfill or destruction. Without this information, trying to reduce the fashion industry’s carbon footprint is a bit like trying to solve a puzzle in the dark.
The available statistics suggest that between 80 billion and 150 billion garments are made every year and that between 10% and 40% of these are not sold. So it could be 8 billion or 60 billion excess garments per year – an alarming disparity.
“Production volumes represent a really important opportunity to bring honesty back into the conversation,” says Liz Ricketts, the co-founder and executive director of the Or Foundation, an environmental justice charity based in Ghana. “It’s a data point that everyone has accessible to them. It’s just about companies being willing to share it.”
“The reason they don’t really like to talk about how much product they have is because it’s the dirty secret of the industry,” says Francois Souchet, a circular economy and sustainability strategist. “There’s likely to be a huge public backlash when people understand how much product is not sold.”
Overproduction is also symptomatic of an archaic manufacturing system that incentivises volume: the more T-shirts ordered, the cheaper the price for each garment. This is because the biggest costs of producing fabric and assembling garments are in the setup; the longer the assembly line runs, the more efficient it is. “On top of all that, brands are afraid of missing out on a sale, so they always order too much, rather than not enough,” says Souchet.
The exorbitant waste in the industry is a result of how disposable clothes are considered in wealthy countries. It is symbolic, too, of how well supply chains are hidden from and misunderstood by consumers.
But excess stock is not the only problem, says Ricketts: “We try to use the language of ‘oversupply’ more than ‘overproduction’, because we’re talking about the marketing mechanisms used to push oversupply on to consumers. Brands are manufacturing demand in the same way they manufacture too many clothes.” This demand is created through relentless marketing across social media, targeted digital adverts, email campaigns, and a seemingly never-ending cycle of discounts and promotions.
Of course, the other side of this coin is overconsumption. It’s difficult to say without knowing how much product goes unsold, but it’s clear that garments that are bought account for most of the industry’s carbon footprint. “If we say, conservatively, 60% to 70% of garments get sold, that’s where the bulk of the emissions are,” says Souchet.
