Arbor Week is celebrated in the first week of September. Picture: Karen Sandison
Every year during the first week of September, South Africans commemorate Arbor Week to teach people about the importance of trees and how to maintain them.
During this week, more trees are planted and the communities learn more about indigenous trees that are part of South Africa’s heritage, which include the Sophia Town Oak tree and the Sagole Baobab tree.
With global warming taking over the planet, it is important for people, especially those in the fashion industry to protect the trees.
Earth Day reports that over 200 million trees are cut down and transformed into textiles for clothing, particularly, fast fashion.
To make them “fashionable,” the trees are logged, processed with chemicals, dissolved into wood pulp and then transformed into cellulosic fabrics like viscose, rayon, lyocell, modal and cupro.
This puts the trees at risk due to the high demand for wood pulp and it is expected that, by 2035, at least the production of wood pulp for fashion-use will be 15 million tons higher.
This is why the fashion industry should focus more on slow fashion instead of fast fashion to reduce the number of trees used to produce textiles.
“Fast fashion has completely revolutionised the apparel industry, but not for the better. Behind every piece of clothing in a store, there is an industry stripping the earth of its limited resources and exploiting the labour force that works in its garment factories.
“Tremendous waste characterises this industry as it depletes healthy soil, contaminates fresh water sources, pollutes the air we breathe, defiles our oceans, destroys forests and damages ecosystems and the health of their biodiversity,” reads a statement by Earth Day.
Furthermore, the responsibility not only falls on the designers. Consumers must also play their part in ensuring they do not harm the environment by supporting fast fashion.
They are responsible for educating themselves about sustainable fashion, choosing quality over quantity and shopping for clothes made of natural materials such as organic cotton, linen or hemp.
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