Fast fashion retailer H&M is all set to sell second-hand clothes at its Regent Street flagship store in UK from October — offering items that are “ready to be loved again.” This marks the second H&M store to introduce a collection of second-hand clothing, following the launch in Barcelona earlier this year.

Additionally, H&M also has a presence in the second-hand market with online offerings available in Sweden and Germany. Zara recently launched its online second-hand service in France, having trialled it in Britain since November last year.

This is just one of the many 'green initiatives' that global fast fashion has taken.

But why are fast-fashion brands getting so proactive?

The cost of fast fashion

Well for that you need to know that annually, 92 million tonnes of clothing is either dumped in landfills or burned. Additionally, according to a report by The Boston Consulting Group, published in 2017 titled 'Pulse of the fashion industry - Global Fashion Agenda,’ by 2030, this figure is expected to go up to 134 million tonnes.

In the United States alone, on an individual level, the average American unconsciously contributes to this crisis by casually tossing away approximately 37 kilograms of clothing annually.

Further, according to a report by BBC, the fashion industry is responsible for 10 percent of all greenhouse gas emissions, with textile production alone estimated to release 1.2 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere every year.

Additionally, The New York Times reported that H&M, as of 2019, churns out three billion garments a year and, was sitting on $4.1 billion worth of unsold clothes.

However, the primary reason why fast fashion companies are taking these green initiatives in Europe is because the European Union (EU) plans new regulations to reduce textile waste. And companies like H&M and Zara are acknowledging their role in the problem.

What do EU regulations say?

In June, the EU adopted recommendations for the body’s strategy, including policies to make clothes tougher, repairable and recyclable. They also backed regulations which suggest production must respect human, social and label rights, animal welfare and the environment throughout the entire supply chain.

The European Commission wants all planned regulations requiring fashion companies to produce clothes in a more sustainable way to be in place by 2028, reported Reuters.

As per the regulations reported by Euronews, "Consumers alone cannot reform the global textile sector through their purchasing habits. If we allow the market to self-regulate, we leave the door open for a fast fashion model that exploits people and the planet’s resources. The EU must legally oblige manufacturers and large fashion companies to operate more sustainably.”

Under the regulations, the European Commission (EC) is set to impose conditions on fashion companies, mandating them to either recover a certain proportion of textile waste corresponding to their production volume or contribute a fee to support local waste collection initiatives.

The specified percentage will undergo gradual increments over time. While the EC is still finetuning the initial percentage, it is expected to exceed the 5 percent mark of production, as reported by Reuters quoting the EU Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius.

The European Union's overarching objective is to encourage fashion companies to manufacture more enduring and recyclable apparel by 2030.

Within the EU, approximately 5.8 million tonnes of textile products are discarded annually, equating to an average of 11 kg per person.

Alarming EU statistics reveal that a truckload of textile products is either landfilled or incinerated somewhere in the world every single second.

Parallelly, the EC is actively developing regulations to restrict the misuse of sustainable claims by clothing brands in their advertising. They estimate that roughly half of these assertions, often referred to as ‘eco-labels,’ are deceptive or misleading. Now this leads us to the whole gamble of greenwashing.

"Zara, H&M, Shein and other famous fast fashion brands are not new to greenwashing, they often bring out green initiatives to show that they are sustainable but investigations have shown how ineffective these green initiatives have been," said Vathi Reddy, a sustainability, climate activist based out of Hyderabad.

Could selling second-hand clothes be another 'greenwashing' initiative?

Greenwashing was coined by environmentalist Jay Westervelt in 1986 — it refers to misleading advertisements or false claims by companies that suggest they are doing more for the environment than they are. Fast fashion companies have been accused of greenwashing now and then.

For instance, according to a report released by the non-profit, Changing Markets Foundation, in 2021, 59 percent of all green claims by European and UK fashion brands were found to be misleading. Despite pledges to reduce their environmental footprint, a large majority of brands are still reliant on fossil fuel-based synthetic fibres. Some of them are also failing to show credible information about how they plan to reduce their environmental footprint.

When it comes to H&M, the report suggested that 96 percent of the company’s 'green' claims flouted competition and market guidelines in one way or another.

In fact, in 2022 a lawsuit was filed against the company for greenwashing.

However in 2023, as reported by Reuters, a federal judge in the Eastern District of Missouri dismissed the proposed class action lawsuit against H&M for its ‘Conscious Choice’ line of products based, in part, on a finding that the plaintiff's allegations — that H&M's ‘sustainable’ marketing violated California and Missouri consumer protection laws, as well as the FTC's rules for the use of environmental marketing claims, known as Green Guides — were not supported.

The FTC did, however, caution marketers against using vague ‘general environmental benefit claims’ like ‘eco-friendly,’ ‘greener,’ and ‘environmentally friendly,’ as these claims are difficult to substabtiate.

In keeping with this trend, the FTC announced in December 2022 that it is revisiting the Green Guides and is reconsidering its omission of ‘sustainable’ guardrails.

Maybe, it's not all just greenwashing …

According to a report titled ‘Impakter Sustainability Index,’ published this year, H&M reacted and took measures after the greenwashing scandal.

The report pointed out that there have been initiatives to incorporate a higher proportion of recycled materials into their clothing, currently accounting for 17.9 percent of the total production. Additionally, endeavours to reduce water usage and adopt eco-friendly packaging practices have been reported.

Additionally, when it comes to Zara, the company has a green initiative run by their subsidiary Inditex, which in March said it placed 10 percent more items of clothing on the market globally last year than in 2021, and aims to use 40 percent recycled fibres in garments by 2030 as part of sustainability goals announced in July.

Notably, Puma has established collaborations with clothing collections and sorting firms such as I:CO in Germany, Texaid in Switzerland, and Vestisolidale in Italy.

Adidas, Bestseller, and H&M have made investments in the Finnish startup Infinite Fiber Company, which specialises in producing fibres from textile waste, cardboard, and paper.

H&M also has pledged to achieve net zero by 2040 and to cut its absolute emissions by 56 percent by 2030, which stands behind H&M's climate goals.

Now whether this second-hand clothes initiative will just be a greenwashing tactic or will help both H&M and Zara clean up their ‘landfill’ act is something that only time will tell. As reports and experts have already pointed out, it remains to be seen how effective these measures will be as much depends on management following through the promises made.

In conclusion, it is a heartening fact that these companies are at least recognising the dangers of fast fashion and working towards cleaning the mess that has been created over the years.

(Edited by : Shoma Bhattacharjee)

First Published:Sept 18, 2023 6:07 PM IST