Waste on the Tip of the Tongue: Social Eating Livestreams (Chibo) in the Age of Chinese Affluence

This article investigates Chinese social eating livestreams (chibo) in the context of China’s 2020 campaign against food waste. It argues that the subgenre ‘big stomach kings’, a target of the campaign, evinces the moral implications of Chinese affluence, of which food waste is exemplary. The emerging affluence in China has normalized conspicuous, wasteful consumption and given rise to a local form of flaunting wealth called ‘xuanfu’. Chinese social media are inundated with xuanfu images, a symptom of the necessary psychosocial adaptation to affluence. Isolating the ‘big stomach kings’ livestreams from the social context of xuanfu, the anti-waste campaign glosses over the underlying social issue of the vast wealth gap between the affluent and the poor. To expose the ethical controversy of these livestreams, the article also analyzes their gender politics by parsing the mystifying image of female ‘big stomach kings’, whose slim bodies are in stark contrast to their enormous appetites.

Waste Management Strategies in Textile & Garment Sector

Textiles and Apparel (T&A) sector is one of the most significant industrial sectors and plays a major role towards contribution to national economy, employment generation and exports in developing countriesand most essential consumer goods industry. However, textile industry is accused of being one of the most polluting industries. Not only production but consumption of textiles also produces waste. To counter the problem, textile industry has taken many measures for reducing its negative contribution towards environment. One of such measures is textile recycling- the reuse as well as reproduction of fibers from textile waste. Recycling can be done through thermal, material, chemical and mechanical processes. Textile recycling is beneficial for environmental and economic conditions, reducing demand for textile chemicals, requirement of landfill space is reduced, consumption of less energy and reducing of water wastage. Market research, and efforts are needed to increase consumer awareness and to encourage manufacturers to increase the use of recycled textile waste into new products. Fashion consumption and sustainability are often opposing ideas. Fashion consumption is a highly resource-intensive, wasteful practice; and sustainability frowns on wasteful consumption. Sustainability in the fashion business is still an emerging agenda, not yet established, and many authors have recognised the importance of investigating how sustainability could be achieved

Fast fashion faces rising sustainability pressure

Subject Outlook for the fast fashion industry. Significance The fashion industry is the second most polluting in the world after the oil industry. The environmental footprint of a manufactured garment comprises a trail of multiple toxic processes from cotton planting (passing through processing and dyeing) and transport to the points of sale and finally, disposal after use. ‘Fast fashion’, premised on low cost and low durability, has widened this footprint by accelerating wasteful fashion consumption. Impacts Public awareness about climate change will help increase consumer concern about wasteful consumption, including of fashion items. Policies to promote sustainable agriculture in cash crops such as cotton will have a positive spillover impact on the fashion industry. Tax subsidies for firms that limit their environmental footprint would enable smaller ones to absorb the cost of sustainability actions. The use of monofibres, which are more environmentally friendly, will rise gradually. The trend among fashion firms towards buying back used products and reusing them in the production of new items will rise.

The Business of More

This chapter pans out from the islands of the Pacific to analyze the forces of unsustainable production and consumption underlying the global sustainability crisis. It demonstrates how, everywhere, inequality is increasing, as is conspicuous, wasteful consumption as companies pursue more sales and more profits. The chapter highlights how advertisers manufacture desires and needs, how big-box retailers and brand manufacturers claiming to be responsible and sustainable are selling inexpensive, nondurable products, and how governments finance infrastructure (e.g., subsidizing roads and bridges) to stimulate even higher levels of consumption. States pursue more consumption in the name of economic growth; multinational corporations for more profits for owners and shareholders; and the world’s billionaires to amass even more wealth. One result, as this chapter documents, is extreme and rising inequality, with 1 percent of the world’s population now controlling approximately half of the world’s wealth. Other results include rising ecological footprints, overexploitation of natural resources, and an escalating global environmental crisis – the themes of the book’s next chapter.