Homo Sustentabilis: circular economy and new business models in fashion industry

Abstract

The overconsumption of fashion clothes and accessories is a dramatic reality in the last decades, linked with the world economic growth. Also the life cycle of the fashion items become shorter, ruled by "fast fashion" industry and moved by consumers' desires (but not needs). The programed obsolesce is critical for this business strategy, reducing the Product Life Cycle to few weeks. But this short time of cloths usage before disposal is an enormous environmental problem. A behaviour of fashion overconsumption leads to an excessive use of natural resources (mainly fibres and water) and energy, generating millions of tons of textiles wastes every year and requires a transition model for sustainability and circular economy. End-of-life textiles are very complex to treat after disposal by the range of different fibers included, by the different industrial processes done (including dying processes) and by the different clothing accessories (buttons, zips, metallic items, plastics and labels). It is needed new business models, focused in circular economy approaches, where the Homo Sustentabilis has the main role. Corporate Social Responsibility inside the companies can be integrated with the new challenges and opportunities assessed by Industry 4.0 framed by the Forth Industrial Revolution, responding at the environmental and social demanding of the millennial and Z generations.

Fast Fashion Avoidance Beliefs and Anti-Consumption Behaviors: The Cases of Korea and Spain

“…Although the study has limitations in terms of generalizing the results due to convenience sampling in Korea and Spain, we investigated the conceptual structures of fast fashion avoidance beliefs that influence the anti-consumption of fast fashion to diagnose the current stage and suggest the future of fast fashion. Previous studies on anti-fast fashion have focused on the effect of sustainable consumption, such as attitudes toward sustainable fashion [4,40,60], ethical concerns [20,56], and attitudes toward fast fashion [23,24], on purchasing fast fashion. The current study expanded the understanding of anti-fast fashion behavior to determine avoidance beliefs as drivers to evoke avoidance behavior by adopting the framework of fast fashion avoidance.…”

“…For example, last year, the "school global strike" involved more than one hundred nations and millions of young students around the world. In Portugal, over 20,000 students in 51 cities protested against the current status of the country's environmental policies; "There is no planet B" or "Our future is on your hands" were some slogans supported by Generation Z [23]. In other words, consumers resist, reject, or reduce their consumption of the goods and services of fast fashion [23,43] because of social, environmental, and ethical issues.…”

“…Even though young consumers are the main target customers for fast fashion brands, their preference for fast fashion is changing because of environmental problems (e.g., pollution and waste caused by manufacturing and production), human rights issues in developing countries where the clothing items are manufactured, and the copying of popular luxury brand designs. According to Marques et al's paper [23], the Z and M generations in Europe (e.g., Portugal, Germany, Spain, etc.) mounted protests against politicians, businessmen, and consumers to declare a "climate emergency".…”

“…In comparing consumers' fast fashion experiences, further studies are required to test the formation of avoidance beliefs and predict the behavior of sustainable fashion consumption. Previous studies [4,23,24] referred the gap between attitudes and behaviors of fast fashion. Kim et al [25] suggested the moderating effects of the lack of alternatives between the beliefs and behaviors of fast fashion avoidance.…”

Synthesis of Sustainable Circular Economy in Palm Oil Industry Using Graph-Theoretic Method

“…This way, it can help to reveal the unforeseen weaknesses of the implementation of the sustainable circular economy, which offers greater variety in designing the debottlenecking strategy [26,62]. In the formulation of these indicators, the perception study of consumers and investors, technological advancement, and the rise of Industry 4.0 can also be considered as they are parts of the motivations in the transition to circular economy [63].…”