Reshaping the fashion industry

The way we understand fashion is changing. Fashion is no longer just about looking good, it is about being environmentally and ethically aware of how the clothes are being manufactured, where they are coming from, and what impact a piece of clothing has on our environment. This will be the focal point of DEDI Green Gate 2022. 

By Agnete Flyger

Have you ever had a jacket or a dress, passed down from a parent, in top-notch shape? With no holes, not even the slightest fade in its color, and with every button intact? You probably thought to yourself: wow, my parents really knew how to take care of their clothes for decades. But was that actually the case? Or was the garment itself drastically different from the garments you find today in chain clothing stores?

The truth is that the glitz and glamour associated with the fashion industry comes with a heavy price –not just literally. The fashion industry is in fact one of the industries that account for the highest annual carbon emissions globally, about 8-10% of the world’s carbon emissions, and nearly 20% of worldwide wastewater comes from the fashion industry. And while flying is widely thought of as one of the biggest “climate sinners”, it is worth mentioning that the fashion industry actually takes up more energy than both aviation and shipping combined.

This makes the fashion industry one of the main contributors to the rapidly growing climate crisis that we are currently facing and for too long it has gone unnoticed. However, it is no small challenge to address the environmental and ethical problems of the fashion industry because it is composed of many actors forming one of the longest and most complicated industrial chains involving agriculture, chemical fibre production, textile and apparel manufacturing, retail and service sectors, second-hand markets, and waste management. So how do we tackle this?

Among the many initiatives paving the way for sustainable fashion is raising awareness of the disposal of clothes. The efforts span from creating chemical recycling technologies as well as clothing rental and upcycling initiatives to prolong the lifespan of the garments and thereby help combat over-consumption. There are biodegradable textiles such as leather-like materials made from pineapple leaf fiber and organic apple waste. Independent fashion designers are advocating the concept of slow fashion, a reaction to “fast fashion” and mindless consumption, that advocates for buying better-quality garments that will last longer, and values fair treatment of people, animals, and the planet along the way.

Innovating sustainability in fashion

 Consumers are becoming gradually more aware of the fashion industry’s impact on the environment and its exploitation of cheap labor under inhumane working conditions in the Global South. There is a growing demand for sustainable fashion brands that promise to deliver more ethical clothing, utilize new kinds of fabric and employ sustainable production processes.

Faced with this demand for more sustainable brands, the fashion industry has begun its journey down the long road towards a more accountable future. This exciting development has opened the market to tons of new and creative innovations within the field of fashion and sustainability.

Among the many initiatives paving the way for sustainable fashion is raising awareness of the disposal of clothes. The efforts span from creating chemical recycling technologies as well as clothing rental and upcycling initiatives to prolong the lifespan of the garments and thereby help combat over-consumption. There are biodegradable textiles such as leather-like materials made from pineapple leaf fiber and organic apple waste. Independent fashion designers are advocating the concept of slow fashion, a reaction to “fast fashion” and mindless consumption, that advocates for buying better-quality garments that will last longer, and values fair treatment of people, animals, and the planet along the way.

DEDI’s response 

While there is still a long way to go for the fashion industry to become sustainable, the above-mentioned efforts are leading the way into the future of fashion. As an attempt to support these efforts, DEDI has created this year’s Green Gate project with a focus on sustainable fashion and textiles. DEDI Green Gate 2022 project is all about exploring and promoting solutions while gaining insights into the different contexts of Denmark and Egypt. As the supply chain of the fashion industry is spread all over the world, it is important to connect different aspects of the challenges that we are facing to better understand what can be done.

This is why Green Gate is bringing together twelve Danish and twelve Egyptian green entrepreneurs to share their experiences and knowledge with the aim to foster mutual cooperation and to promote innovative solutions around this theme.

The participants will come together for two workshops, each a week long, in Egypt and Denmark respectively. In the first workshop in Denmark this August, they will be working on a sustainable business canvas of their individual business, they will be getting inspiration and gaining new knowledge from field visits as well as participate in a technical session led by an expert in the sustainable fashion field. Later in the year when they reunite in Egypt in October, they will learn more about Egyptian cotton and its supply chain as well as doing workshops and field trips with the aim of expanding their understanding of the global fashion and textiles practices within sustainability.

Read more from DEDI: 

Local stories of climate change

Greening Cairo 

A Sustainable Collaboration