UNSTITCHED: Rethinking How Environmental Impact Is Measured in Early-Stage Fashion Ventures

Sammanfattning

Early-stage sustainable fashion enterprises face a structural paradox: they are increasingly expected by funders, investors, and programme partners to demonstrate measurable environmental performance, yet the ISO-compliant Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) that rigorous measurement demands is largely inaccessible to ventures operating with small teams, limited data infrastructure, and constrained budgets. This gap is especially consequential in development finance contexts, where environmental data quality is a direct prerequisite for capital access, yet the conditions for full LCA implementation are least likely to exist. This thesis designs and validates a set of life-cycle-informed environmental impact indicators that are credible, feasible, and legible to both environmental and financial audiences, specifically for early-stage sustainable fashion enterprises in Global South contexts. The study asks how indicators can be designed to credibly measure sustainability performance while remaining operationally feasible under real-world data and capacity constraints, and through what mechanism structured environmental data reduces information asymmetry and improves enterprise bankability. A sequential four-stage methodology was employed: structured literature review and indicator longlisting, a modified Delphi validation with ten purposively selected experts across sustainability, impact investment, development finance, and enterprise founding, and embedded comparative case studies of two UNDP Youth4Climate-supported enterprises: Manifiesta (Colombia) and Inkaya - Community Studio (Zambia). Three of five proposed indicators, namely Water Risk Tier, Renewable Energy Share, and Fabric Utilisation Rate, reached full expert consensus (mean Relevance and Feasibility ≥4.0), while Material Carbon Intensity and Chemistry Compliance Level were retained as aspirational indicators with clear upgrade pathways. The central empirical finding is that feasibility, not relevance, is the binding constraint; and that feasibility divides sharply along a supplier-dependency axis: indicators enterprises can measure themselves achieve consensus, while those requiring voluntary upstream disclosure do not. Both case enterprises demonstrate strong environmental practice with inadequate documentation, precisely the information asymmetry the framework targets. The validated five-indicator framework, paired with a Bronze-Silver-Gold Data Quality Score mechanism, offers a transparent, actionable, and institutionally legible tool for early-stage founders, impact investors, and development programme monitors alike.