New European campaign targets fast fashion #167

The European Commission is set to launch a new campaign aimed at raising awareness of the environmental impact of the fast fashion industry. The ‘Beyond Your Clothes’ campaign - part of the European Union-funded 'SMART Textile & Garments' project - will be launched on Monday 12th April. It aims to raise awareness of the environmental impact of growing clothes consumption which it says has increased by 60 per cent in the last 15 years.

The campaign includes an interactive website – beyondyourclothes.com – to provide different layers of information to a wide audience, from fast fashion consumers to sustainability activists.

With content provided by Greenpeace, ILO, and UNICEF, it will be supported on social media with some of the world’s most popular sustainable influencers recruited to help spread the message.

“Nowadays, our consuming habits have massively evolved, with brands creating up to 52 different collections per year compared to just two seasons a few decades ago,” said a statement by the campaign organisers.

“This purchase behaviour brings catastrophic consequences to our environment, given that now, the clothing and textile industry is currently the second largest polluter in the world.

“Meanwhile, the social impact of the textile and garment industry is colossal. The global outsourcing of the textile and clothing industry has gone hand-in-hand with an almost complete erosion of the labour and social rights of workers.”

The Beyond Your Clothes campaign was designed by 360 Agency Berlin whose founder Andrea Henao said: “It is essential to mirror what truly stands behind our clothes consumption and to experience that small changes can have some great impacts.”

It aims to tie in with the EU’s Strategy for Sustainable Textiles and the European Green Deal which identifies textiles as a priority sector to pave the way towards a carbon neutral and circular economy.

Ecotextile