NHCE2024 theme: fast fashion
This year's NHCE theme is fast fashion. From Monday, February 5th to Friday, February 9th you will work on an actual issue from one of our partners: fast fashion-giant H&M and circular fashion-company New Optimist. Your ideas will be the driving force to accelerate the shift from fast fashion to slow fashion. Together with students from all over the Netherlands and with different educational backgrounds, you will work on a solution to the issue. The highlight? The Grande Finale on Friday, February 9th, where the best ideas will be pitched to a jury of experts.
Why slow fashion?
Over the years, clothing has become so cheap that we have come to regard it as a disposable product. Yearly, more than a hundred billion (!) garments are produced. Most of these garments end up in either landfills or incinerators within a year. And if the garments bought by a consumer, they are on average worn no more than 7 times in total. (BNNVARA, 2018)
The fashion industry is responsible for 8-10% of global emissions (BBC, 2022), due to the use of natural resources and the emission of greenhouse gas. Aditionally, human rights are still violated in this industry. To create a sustainable and just world, transitioning to a slow fashion industry is essential.
The NHCE2024 cases
This year's NHCE has two case holders: H&M and New Optimist.
- H&M is a Swedish fashion giant with almost 2000 stores worldwide. Their case focusses on scaling options for rental.
- New Optimist is a circular fashion pioneer that focusses on closing the loop. Their case focusses 'Statiegeld' (deposit) and the options a digital passport to support the statiegeld-system.