WASHINGTON, DC – Last week, representatives from the US fashion industry testified in a congressional briefing to inform lawmakers about some of the major problems the industry is now facing and to demand legislative action to support moral and sustainable business practices.
Before New York Fashion Week, organizations like PoliticallyinFashion, Rebecca Ballard Advisory, Transparentem, and TS Designs held a briefing where they discussed a variety of issues, including the opportunities presented by regenerative and circular fashion as well as the industry’s overall ethical and environmental impact.
ACT’s Rachel Kibbe highlighted circular business models and offered policy recommendations that would increase textiles’ potential to be recycled while also boosting the economy and jobs in the United States. Exemptions from second-hand sales and use taxes and extended producer responsibility (EPR) for textiles were two of these policy options.
These tactics, according to her, demonstrated how carefully considered regulatory measures may play a critical role in reducing ethical and environmental concerns while concurrently fostering economic growth within the fashion industry.
According to Kibbe, “Textile waste is the country’s fastest-growing waste stream, and it comes at a cost to both the environment and US taxpayers who must pay for clothes to be burned and hauled to our overflowing landfills.” This need not be the situation. “But this can only happen if the fashion industry and policymakers collaborate on supportive policy that supports the infrastructure, logistics, market dynamics, and innovation required to transition from linear to circular systems,” says the report. “There is a world in which both textile reuse and recycling can be as, or more, accessible than other household waste streams.”
The presenters also discussed the effects on Americans of certain ethical and sustainability issues in the fashion industry. The amount of forced labor in the fashion business, as well as the present laws and regulations in the United States that aim to prevent it, were discussed by Rebecca Ballard of Rebecca Ballard Advisory.
Ballard and E. Benjamin Skinner of Transparentem presented possible approaches to deal with the persistent issue. You cannot compete in the market with goods produced with forced labor, she continued. “The United States is the only nation with both civil and criminal punishments, and it has the strongest legislation of any nation prohibiting imports created with forced labor. However, there is an increase in forced labor worldwide.
The amount of forced labor in the fashion business, as well as the present laws and regulations in the United States that aim to prevent it, were discussed by Rebecca Ballard of Rebecca Ballard Advisory.
Ballard and E. Benjamin Skinner of Transparentem presented possible approaches to deal with the persistent issue. You cannot compete in the market with goods produced with forced labor, she continued. “The United States is the only nation with both civil and criminal punishments, and it has the strongest legislation of any nation prohibiting imports created with forced labor. However, there is an increase in forced labor worldwide.
