FAST FASHION'S HIDDEN TOLL

What Your Clothes Cost the Planet

- Gauri Ghadge

On a breezy evening in Goa, it's easy to see fashion as harmless fun: flowy dresses, slogan T-shirts, colourful resort wear picked up on a whim. But behind that "holiday wardrobe" lies a global machine called fast fashion - a system built on speed, volume, and disposability, and one of the most resource-hungry, polluting and exploitative industries on the planet.

Fast fashion promises style at the speed of your Instagram scroll: new drops every week, rock-bottom prices and the constant pressure to buy more. The true cost, however, is not printed on the tag. It is measured in rivers drained, oceans polluted, landfills overflowing, and workers pushed to breaking point. And the bill is arriving faster than we realise today.

WATER: THE INVISIBLE INGREDIENT IN EVERY

GARMENT Most of us rarely connect our wardrobe to the water crisis. Yet the fashion industry is one of the world's most water-intensive consumer sectors. Studies estimate that producing a single cotton T-shirt can require around 2,500-2,700 litres of water - roughly what one person would drink in two and a half years.

Most of this "hidden" water is used not only to grow cotton but also in dyeing, washing and finishing fabrics.

The demand for cheap cotton has damaged ecosystems far from any fashion capital. The Aral Sea in Central Asia - once one of the world's largest lakes - has shrunk to a fraction of its size because of irrigation for cotton and crops that feed markets in Europe and beyond.

Goa may not grow cotton, but it imports cotton-rich garments and textiles every tourist season. When we choose ultra-cheap T-shirts that last only a handful of wears, we are also "importing" this water footprint - and then throwing it away.

MICROPLASTICS: WHEN YOUR CLOTHES BECOME OCEAN POLLUTION