Driving Sustainability in 2025
Sustainability in 2025 is more complex, more politicised, and more urgent than ever before. It is also more collaborative, more informed, and more determined. Earth Day is a timely reminder that the choices made today will define the world inherited tomorrow. Ahead of Global Fashion Summit: Copenhagen Edition 2025 – centred around the theme Barriers and Bridges – we reflect on a moment defined by both challenge and possibility. Regulatory uncertainty, economic volatility, and geopolitical fragmentation pose significant obstacles, but bridges are being built through innovation, cooperation, and the shared drive for a better future.
To understand sustainability in 2025 is to understand five powerful forces shaping it: Innovation, Capital, Courage, Incentives, and Regulation.
The tools required for progress already exist. From regenerative materials and lower impact dyes to data driven transparency and circular design, fashion has never had more solutions at its fingertips. In 2025, innovation must go beyond inspiration, and it must drive real world impact. The industry is called to accelerate the uptake and integration of solutions that embed sustainability into operations, supply chains, and customer experiences.
Today’s economic landscape is uncertain, but it is also decisive. Capital is not a neutral force; it is a driver of direction. In a world where profit margins often dictate priorities, fashion must embed sustainability into its value proposition. To futureproof operations and build resilience, impact needs to sit at the heart of business models. Global Fashion Agenda’s Fashion on Climate report confirms that while decarbonising the industry requires significant investment, over half of the required actions would result in net cost savings. Long term value lies in responsible investment across infrastructure, innovation, and workforce.
Sustainability requires more than strategies and demands moral clarity and bold leadership. Political shifts and social tensions may threaten progress, but the fashion industry must stay the course. From a citizen perspective, 92% of people say they want to live sustainably, yet only 16% take consistent action. The gap between values and behaviour must be bridged by courageous leadership that inspires, enables, and unites. Systemic transformation is possible when businesses lead not in isolation, but in community, even when the path ahead is uncertain.
The urgency of this moment demands clear and compelling incentives. Economic motivation must also be aligned with environmental and social impact. As the industry faces increasing pressure to deliver measurable progress, well designed incentives can accelerate transformation.
Fashion has moved from a largely unregulated industry to one navigating an increasingly complex patchwork of policy frameworks. Legislative developments vary widely, from progressive mandates in some regions to rollbacks and deregulation in others. Amid this confusion lies a profound opportunity: to shape regulation that not only drives compliance but also enables systemic change. A cohesive and collaborative approach to policy can transform the industry’s operating environment, promoting transparency, circularity, and competitiveness. Voluntary action remains important, but it is no longer sufficient on its own. Regulation, when co-created with industry, can help deliver the scale and speed required.
Fashion is a global force that is culturally influential, economically powerful, and uniquely positioned to lead by example. The road ahead will not be straightforward but the climate crisis is a present and compounding reality. While the barriers to progress are real, so too are the bridges that can carry the industry forward.
For over 16 years, Global Fashion Agenda has worked to unite the fashion ecosystem around shared commitments to sustainability. In 2025, this mission has never been more critical. This year’s Global Fashion Summit will provide a platform to explore dualities: challenge and solution, resistance and resilience, barriers and bridges.
Sustainability in 2025 demands innovation, investment, brave leadership, thoughtful incentive structures, and supportive regulatory frameworks. With courage, collaboration, and commitment, fashion can transform, not just to survive in a changing world, but to thrive in it.
Global Fashion Agenda announces sequel to ‘Fashion Redressed’ series produced by BBC StoryWorks Commercial Productions.
Without addressing the deeply embedded social issues interwoven with fashion industry, any vision of sustainability remains incomplete. Sustainability must be understood in all its nuance.
This article is a contribution from Next Gen Assembly 2024 Member, Harry Vine.
