From Manufacturing Garments for Ready-to-Wear to Designing Collections for Fast Fashion: Evidence from Turkey

In this paper we discuss two distinct sets of advantages which have helped Turkey to become the world's second-largest clothing exporter: the competency-related advantages of the last decade; and the trade-and-currency-related advantages of the earlier decades. In the late 1980s and 1990s, some fortunate developments in the international currency markets, together with an unofficial trade with Russia following the collapse of the Soviet Union, resulted in windfall trade gains for Turkey. During the last decade, a shift in the culture of fashion, from ready-to-wear to fast fashion pushed Turkish suppliers to upgrade into higher value-added activities such as design. While our focus is on the latter advantage, we point out that both sets of advantages have a commonality: namely, a sustainability problem.