Skip to main content
Cornell University mobile logo
Dignity factory workers producing shirts for overseas clients, in Accra, Ghana

Hot Air: How will fashion adapt to accelerating climate change?

Impacts of Climate Change on Global Apparel Production

How have weather conditions already changed in major apparel production centers? In this follow-up to our Higher Ground? reports, we looked at the past twenty years of weather data in our 23 focus cities to try and find that out, as well as ask how workers, brands and retailers, manufacturers and their governments should react and adapt to our warming future in a world of corporate due diligence. Read our findings here.

A flooded area near to Phnom Penh, Cambodia
/global-labor-institute/research-0/gli-hot-air

Measuring Supply Chain Due Diligence

Labor Outcomes Metrics

Read about the Global Labor Institute's new quantitative metrics that measure labor outcomes—actual impacts for workers.

Workers in Bangladesh
Read more about Measuring Supply Chain Due Diligence

Latest Events

Video: Sarosh Kuruvilla’s Conference keynote speech

GLI Academic Director brings new data and analysis of private regulation of labor practices
Icon
Sarosh Kuruvilla, Cornell University
Video: Sarosh Kuruvilla’s Conference keynote speech

Video: Thea Lee’s 2022 Conference keynote speech

USDOL Deputy Undersecretary lays out changes for labor provisions in U.S. trade policy and agreements
Icon
Thea Lee, Deputy Undersecretary, U.S. Department of Labor
Video: Thea Lee’s 2022 Conference keynote speech

Speakers and scenes from 2022 NYC Conference

Three crucial questions for global labor governance: Where are we headed with human rights due diligence, private regulation and labor rights in trade policy?” Too long?
Speaker on stage with microphone
Speakers and scenes from 2022 NYC Conference

Global Severance Pay Program Outlined

When apparel factories shut down due to COVID-19, many workers lost their incomes. ILR’s New Conversations Project proposes a model to protect workers.
garment workers in a factory
Global Severance Pay Program Outlined

ILR and ILO Make Suggestions to Help Fishers in Southeast Asia

Researchers from ILR’s New Conversations Project and the International Labour Organization have documented problems faced by fishers, especially migrants, during the pandemic and provided a list of potential policy changes to effect change.
fishing boat in Thailand
ILR and ILO Make Suggestions to Help Fishers in Southeast Asia

Live Event: Rough Seas - COVID’s impact on work in fishing

New Cornell NCP/ILO Ship to Shore Rights brief on fishing in Southeast Asia looks back at the COVID-19 pandemic impacts and responses.
fishing boat in Thailand
Live Event: Rough Seas - COVID’s impact on work in fishing

In The News

Media Mentions

Jason Judd wants the apparel industry to take heat stress very seriously

Big Closets Small Planet Podcast
The garment industry can mitigate health problems and production slowdowns caused by heat stress, but will it? In this podcast episode, Jason Judd, executive director of the ILR Global Labor Institute, shares a nuanced look at climate change adaptation in the garment industry.
Jason Judd wants the apparel industry to take heat stress very seriously

Commentary: How Chinese imports are skirting Trump’s tariffs

Yahoo News
Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute, explains that Chinese companies are avoiding Trump tariffs because they are increasingly building their own production facilities outside of China.
Commentary: How Chinese imports are skirting Trump’s tariffs

This week in Trumponomics: The looming import shortage

Yahoo News
Once current inventories are gone, the rest of 2025 could be rocky. “Our perspective in terms of how this will affect manufacturers and workers is that we’ll see a replay of the initial COVID shock,” said Jason Judd, executive director of the Global Labor Institute.
This week in Trumponomics: The looming import shortage

To Eliminate Gender Based Violence and Harassment

Dindigul Agreement

This is GLI’s year two assessment of the processes and outcomes of an innovative agreement regarding freedom of association and the elimination of gender based violence at a South Indian apparel factory that could be a model for other factories around the world.

Busy factory floor with rows of sewing stations
Read the report

Higher Ground? Fashion’s Climate Breakdown

Impacts of climate change on global apparel production

In partnership with Schroders, we report the impacts of climate change on global apparel production. In our first report, we track climate change impacts at the global, national, and factory levels. We map fashion's climate vulnerabilities across production centers, and estimate future economic damages from extreme heat and flooding. Our second report examines company-level climate risk, cost, and financing for adaption and just resilience.

Textile workers in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam
Read the reports

Change or Groundhog Day? What new research tells us about what works in global labor governance

2024 GLI Conference Highlights

Samira Rafaela
View more information

Stay Connected

Join the Global Labor Institute mailing list.