KEY POINTS:
When you consider buying that new shirt or dress off the rack, do you give much thought to what it has cost the environment?
Probably not, according to the New Zealand fashion industry, but that is expected to slowly change as the country responds to a growing overseas trend for sustainable clothing.
"It sometimes is difficult to measure," says Mapihi Opai, chief executive of Fashion Industry New Zealand.
"We know consumers are concerned about these things, but when it comes to spending money, it is still a question mark.
"People are looking at size, fit, style, print, price, country of origin - there's a lot of variables stacked up in that decision. Ethical considerations have to weigh in the balance."
A report called Well Dressed? released last year by researchers at Cambridge University in Britain, detailed the heavy cost of the clothing industry on the environment.
It reported, "the environmental impact of the textile industry arises in particular from the use of energy and toxic chemicals. The sector contributes to climate change because of the need to create electricity to heat water and air in laundering." It also reported cotton was the world's most pesticide-dependent crop, requiring 25 per cent of all the world's pesticide to keep it growing.
Only agriculture uses more water than the clothing and textile industry.
Ms Opai recently visited the United Kingdom, where the issue of sustainable clothing has gained "considerable momentum" and many big retailers like Tesco are testing consumer reaction.
In New Zealand, most fashion fabrics are imported from overseas.
"I don't know of fashion or designer companies really examining that side of their business to a very high degree because it is an industry where it will take a bit of time," Ms Opai says. "There is so much change going on, anyway. It is a seasonal industry and they are having to reinvent themselves every six months as it is."
The wool sector in New Zealand has begun looking into how the impact on the environment can be reduced.
A recent study found that production of New Zealand Merino wool fibre uses significantly less energy than it takes to manufacture fossil fuel dependent man-made fibres. The study found nylon manufacture uses over five times more energy.
Untouched World founder Peri Drysdale, whose company has produced luxury garments worn by Hollywood stars such as Sharon Stone and Nicole Kidman, has been widely recognised for showing the way in eco-friendly clothing.
"It's only in the last 12 or 18 months that the whole environmental thing has become cool. It was the opposite of cool when we first started doing it," she says. Her company uses certified organic cotton and merino wool for her garments, recycles buttons and uses pesticide-free bamboo.
"There is so much that can be done relatively easily, and there are some other things that can be done with a little more effort," Ms Drysdale says.
"If the consumer has a choice between product A and B, and the price and quality of both is right, there's a rapidly growing number of people that would consciously choose the product they know is doing the right thing. But a company doing things environmentally absolutely has got to do them right as far as style, fit and fashion. It must be an 'extra', not an 'instead of'."
