Global inequities and emissions in Western European textiles and clothing consumption

TY - JOUR

T1 - Global inequities and emissions in Western European textiles and clothing consumption

AU - Mair, Simon

AU - Druckman, Angela

AU - Jackson, Tim

N1 - Funding Information: This work was jointly supported by the UK's Economic and Social Research Council and Natural Environment Research Council , grant number ES/J500148/1 . We would like to thank Professor Karen Turner and two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments and suggestions. Publisher Copyright: © 2015 Elsevier Ltd

PY - 2016/9/20

Y1 - 2016/9/20

N2 - Rising demand for cheaper textiles and clothing in Western Europe is well documented, as are changes in the Textiles and Clothing industry's globalised production structure. We apply a sub-systems global multi-regional input–output accounting framework to examine the sustainability implications of meeting Western European demand for textiles and clothing goods between 1995 and 2009. Our framework estimates environmental and socio-economic impacts of consumption in a consistent manner and shows where these occur both geographically and in the value chain. The results demonstrate that Western European textiles and clothing consumption remains dependent on low-cost labour from Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC), principally in the Textiles and Clothing and Agricultural sectors. Conversely, we show that the wage rate for BRIC workers in the global value chains serving Western European textiles and clothing consumption has risen over time but remains low relative to the wage rate paid to Western European workers. Likewise, we find that profits are increasingly generated within BRIC and that they are now at comparable levels to those generated in Western Europe. We find a slight overall decrease in the amount of carbon emitted in the production of textiles and clothing goods for Western Europe between 1995 and 2009. However, the trend is not linear and the importance of different underlying drivers varies over the timeseries. We conclude by discussing the implications of these results for a more sustainable future for Western European textiles and clothing consumption.

AB - Rising demand for cheaper textiles and clothing in Western Europe is well documented, as are changes in the Textiles and Clothing industry's globalised production structure. We apply a sub-systems global multi-regional input–output accounting framework to examine the sustainability implications of meeting Western European demand for textiles and clothing goods between 1995 and 2009. Our framework estimates environmental and socio-economic impacts of consumption in a consistent manner and shows where these occur both geographically and in the value chain. The results demonstrate that Western European textiles and clothing consumption remains dependent on low-cost labour from Brazil, Russia, India and China (BRIC), principally in the Textiles and Clothing and Agricultural sectors. Conversely, we show that the wage rate for BRIC workers in the global value chains serving Western European textiles and clothing consumption has risen over time but remains low relative to the wage rate paid to Western European workers. Likewise, we find that profits are increasingly generated within BRIC and that they are now at comparable levels to those generated in Western Europe. We find a slight overall decrease in the amount of carbon emitted in the production of textiles and clothing goods for Western Europe between 1995 and 2009. However, the trend is not linear and the importance of different underlying drivers varies over the timeseries. We conclude by discussing the implications of these results for a more sustainable future for Western European textiles and clothing consumption.

KW - Carbon footprint

KW - Global value chains

KW - Globalisation

KW - Input–output analysis

KW - Social footprint

KW - Textiles & clothing

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84940878789&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.08.082

DO - 10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.08.082

M3 - Article

AN - SCOPUS:84940878789

SN - 0959-6526

VL - 132

SP - 57

EP - 69

JO - Journal of Cleaner Production

JF - Journal of Cleaner Production

ER -