Contributions of social manufacturing to sustainable apparel industry

Abstract

The global apparel and textile market has been changed considerably during the recent years. At the one hand, new trends and consumer preferences for different styles and fashion products emerge continuously, thus the apparel industry becomes more mass customized. On the other hand, attention to social and environmental sustainability has been dramatically increased in the entire industry. However, the current fast-changing fashion trends result to significant environmental and resource depletion problems in the textile lifecycle. As a result, the apparel industry should consider sustainable manufacturing strategies. The current options such as organic fibers and environmentally safe dyes seem promising. Nonetheless, there are significant challenges for apparel manufacturers and retailers to capitalize sustainability. To address these problems, in this paper, we develop a conceptual model of Social Manufacturing for the apparel industry. We study the current value chain of the apparel industry and identify its challenges from the sustainability's view. Then, we propose a new model to improve the sustainability throughout the value chain of the apparel industry.