Did you know Friday, June 8th is World Oceans Day?
Growing Blue reports that 2.5 billion people (36% of the world population) live in water-scarce regions and more than 20% of the global GDP is already produced in risky, water-stressed areas. Growing Blue writes, “Given today’s accelerated pace of human development and the slow pace of managing issues as complex as water resources, tomorrow’s challenges are already at our door.”
Whether individual, collective, agriculturally focused or industrially inclined, addressing water scarcity and protection begins with you. We’ll call it (cough) the ripple effect. While you work on some possible real-life scenarios for making change, we’ve created 10 fashion industry water facts for you to mull over as you ask yourself whether you need to wash your denim tonight.
1. More than 20 percent of the world’s commercial products are produced in increasingly water-scarce areas of the globe. Countries like China, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan are exporting the majority of our clothes and shoes. (Growing Blue)
2. It takes about 2,720 litres of water to produce just one cotton shirt – a number equivalent to what an average person drinks over three years. In one of the 43 countries currently suffering from water scarcity, this is enough to sustain a family of four for almost nine months. (EJF)
3. According to the Environmental Justice Foundation’s report on The True Costs of Cotton, The Aral Sea in Central Asia, once the fourth largest inland sea in the world, has now shrunk to 10% of its former size. The depletion of this resource-rich oasis stands as one of the most condemning examples of unsustainable cotton production. (EJF)
4. The Citarum River in Indonesia, referred to by Indonesian activists and writers as “the cradle of our nation’s culture,” is used as a private sewage dumping system by industrial facilities. 68% of these facilities are producing textiles. The waste from these companies’ printing and dyeing processes are earning the Citarum the reputation as one of the dirtiest rivers on earth. (Greenpeace)
