On 28h October 2022, students participating in the “Co-creative workshop” class of the SCOPE program received members of YASASHII-SEIFUKU, an Inter-school group working toward the sustainability of the apparel industry.
Ema Shimazaki, a first-year student at Chuo University, introduced the origin of their activities when she and her colleague were high school students. Then three high school members explained the problem related to the apparel industry online: the apparel industry places a heavy burden on the environment through water usage, water pollution, greenhouse gas emissions, and the mass disposal of unused clothing. And it is directly related to social issues such as working conditions in sewing factories and child labor in cotton production.
YASASHII-SEIFUKU means environmentally and people-friendly school uniforms. However, in learning more about the apparel industry, they began to focus on selling T-shirts made of organic cotton produced by small farmers in India. Ema explained that they sell T-shirts for school events as a medium for raising awareness among young people.