The vices and potential virtues of the fashion industry. Fashion experience is a journey through a supply chain that wants to become sustainable.
"The truth about what you wear" is the goal of Fashion experience, the interactive installation inaugurated in Milan on Friday 21 June that takes visitors through key moments in the fashion and textile supply chain. The visit to the installation is accompanied by a decalogue of actions to take in order to be a responsible consumer: even small, apparently obvious things make a difference, starting with whether you drive or walk to go shopping.
Organised by Mani Tese and the City of Milan with funding from the Italian Agency for Development Cooperation, the exhibition occupies three spherical pavilions located in piazza XXIV maggio and can be visited free of charge until 30 June.
It begins with the environmental impact of a well-known product — a pair of jeans — whose production, we are told, requires 3,800 litres of water, 12 square metres of land and 33 kilograms of CO2 equivalent. Enormous numbers, when you consider that 3.5 billion pairs are produced every day. It is a vicious circle: the lifespan of garments has shortened, partly due to poor quality, and we buy more and more, partly due to low prices. But the price is only low on the label, because the real cost is paid by someone else. This is the so-called fast fashion model — one of the most environmentally damaging and one of the systems structurally most at risk of worker exploitation.
The second pavilion addresses the social implications of the supply chain: augmented reality helps tell the story of an Indian girl who sews by machine to bring home two dollars a day. In the best case she will manage to balance work with study; in the worst, she will have to abandon her dream of becoming a doctor. "But in this part of the world dreams never come true," the voice narrates. Here too, the figures are staggering: child labour affects 152 million children worldwide, some of whom work up to 12 hours a day.
It is in the final pavilion that the soul of the installation and its educational purpose are revealed: every visitor is a consumer and every consumer is an activist, because they hold in their own hands the possibility — and indeed the responsibility — to choose the right supply chain and show companies the direction to take. First and foremost through their own purchasing habits, but also by making their voice heard and demanding fashion that is #madeinjustice — as the campaign slogan puts it. To this end, in this last stage, as well as showcasing innovative companies that have managed to reconcile profit with rights, the screens guide visitors so they can contact the people responsible at several major brands directly by email to demand transparency, social and environmental responsibility.
"After just the first email, one of these companies asked to meet us for a discussion," says Giosuè De Salvo, Head of Advocacy, Education and Campaigns at Mani Tese. But he does not get carried away — he knows the road is long and greenwashing is always lurking.
One of the reasons Mani Tese chose the fashion and textile sector is that it considers it a mature sector, ready to make the qualitative leap needed to trigger change, also in view of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals for 2030. There are already movements heading in the right direction, brands setting themselves environmental and social sustainability targets, and growing consumer attention to these issues.
"Unfortunately there are no shortcuts to understanding whether a company operates responsibly," De Salvo presses. "You have to inform yourself and understand, even if it isn't easy." That means looking not only behind labels but also behind words; looking beyond the dazzling, attention-grabbing statements whose sole purpose is to silence the less informed — hollow façades that far too often are not backed by concrete facts.
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According to De Salvo, the starting point should be due diligence plans — essential tools that every responsible company should have in place. This would mean carrying out a risk assessment of the supply chain, drawing up policies to prevent those risks from materialising, and implementing procedures to manage violations should they occur, as well as to remedy the harm caused and compensate victims. All of this before even initiating legal proceedings, given that in certain countries access to justice is difficult if not impossible.
Instead, there are companies that, despite claiming to have a transparent supply chain, cannot trace more than a few steps back in the traceability chain of their own suppliers; or that, while asserting they are aligned with social and environmental responsibility standards (for example those relating to child labour, gender equality or the fight against climate change), have no internal policies to address and counter these violations.
The textile supply chain is long and every step is potentially at risk, De Salvo explains, but the hardest part to investigate — and the one that does not receive enough attention — is what comes before the manufacturing stage, for example everything to do with the cultivation, spinning and weaving of cotton. "Companies have offices whose walls are covered in certifications, but that means nothing." In fact, fictitious certifications are the fig leaves that all too often conceal poor management or rights violations.
We must not forget, however, the responsibility of governments, and progress is being made on this front too: many countries have laws designed to combat labour exploitation and modern slavery, to guarantee the respect of workers' fundamental rights and their safety. Worth noting in particular are the Bangladesh Accord, which came into being following the tragedy of Rana Plaza in Dhaka, the Modern Slavery Act in England, and the Devoir de Vigilance in France. While waiting for a European directive, consumers will have to keep up the pressure, and civil society will have to continue monitoring the conduct of brands.