Fashion industry experts saw sustainability efforts slowing down for months. Now, the recent U.S. tariffs imposed on the world could threaten sustainability goals even further, according to The Business of Fashion.
What's happening?
In 2019, The Fashion Pact, a CEO-led initiative to curb the harmful environmental impacts of the fashion industry, was formed. Brands and organizations, including Adidas and Ralph Lauren, charted a collaborative path forward to make sustainable business choices.
According to Kenneth Pucker of The Business of Fashion, fashion sustainability goals like these have slowed. Lower profits, lack of resources, and pressure from investors have spurred companies to cut back on sustainability-focused efforts.
"I felt my work had no real impact on moving the needle toward actual sustainability," Julia Vol, a former corporate sustainability manager, wrote in a LinkedIn post.
"This lack of progress is because brands consistently prioritise short-term profits over the longer term, complex and costly work required to make the industry operate more sustainably," writes Kenneth Pucker.
Now, the recent tariffs and the economic pressure it puts on companies will likely increase a further pullback in these efforts.
"Jobs and factories will come roaring back into our country," President Donald Trump said in announcing sweeping tariffs. Though there was a 90-day pause on most of the tariffs, there is still a 10% tariff on all imported goods and a 145% tariff on China that can reach up to 245% on some goods.
According to Market Watch, approximately 20% of imported clothing in the U.S. comes from China. The tariffs could encourage brands to cut sustainability efforts more to maintain profits, though it could also mean that far fewer clothes and other goods travel great distances if the U.S. imports less, which would reduce pollution.
Why are these tariffs important to the fashion industry?
The fashion industry is massive. Uniform Market estimates the 2025 value of the fashion industry to be $1.84 trillion. Fast fashion, the popular practice of fashion brands to sell cheaply made clothing at low prices, drives profits and increases textiles production. This unfortunately drives fashion waste.
"The industry is creating the clothing to quickly deteriorate, meaning it ends up in landfills and other places in the environment," Pucker said.
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What should the government do about the fast fashion industry?
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Set strict regulations 🚫 According to the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, "the equivalent of one garbage truck full of clothes is burned or dumped in a landfill every second." An abundance of waste can pollute soil, water, and overall disturb public areas, like beaches.
A study from McKinsey found that "the fashion industry emits about the same quantity of greenhouse gases per year as the entire economies of France, Germany, and the United Kingdom combined." The size of the fashion industry drives planet-warming pollution and associated natural disasters.
Sustainability in fashion is vital in decreasing the effects of waste and pollution. But tariffs could put financial strain on brands, forcing them to make cuts to sustainability efforts.
"With smaller teams devoted to sustainability, Trump's tariffs will now make it even harder for public fashion brands to devote meaningful resources and focus to labour rights or climate," Pucker said.
"I may have to choose between cutting corners, raising prices, or breaking the promises my brand was built on," wrote Sara Kazimi, founder of LeoBella, a luxury accessory brand focused on sustainability.
What's being done about tariffs and fashion sustainability?
There are at least two potential silver linings of the tariffs.
First, even though it may cost more for the labor, American-made replacements will generally result in less shipping pollution while in some cases also replacing fast fashion and impulse-buying brands based in China that already have poor reputations on item quality. As noted, though, American-made goods may see a similar drop in quality to compete on pricing, so it's only the shipping pollution reductions that can be counted on as a plus.
Second, and more purely beneficial, an increase in prices of clothing could drive people to thrift or use their items longer instead of buying new items.
"Sales of secondhand goods, not subject to tariffs, will likely also increase, thereby delivering a rare win-win for sustainability professionals committed to restoring the planet to a safe zone," Pucker said.
While thrifting can cut down on the 92 million tons of textile waste produced each year, the tariffs could still be detrimental to the success of small fashion brands. According to PYMNTS, one in five small businesses are at danger of going under due to the tariffs.
Though Congress could act to stop the tariffs, the ordeal still highlights the importance of sustainability in the fashion industry, which is responsible for 2-8% of global carbon pollution. And as some experts have said, an investment in more sustainable practices can pay dividends once the hard part is over.
"Start treating sustainability not as a reporting exercise, but as a strategic opportunity to future-proof the business," Vol wrote in the LinkedIn post.
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