Everyone is talking about robots, and the fashion industry is no exception. Policy makers and companies who own data and robots must consider the impacts that automation is both having and will have on workers around the world.

It's generally accepted that automation and digitalization will increase supply chain productivity and greatly improve the fashion industry’s sustainability performance. From manufacturing to design, to business analysis, jobs in the fashion industry will change as some tasks are automated through the use of robotics and artificial intelligence.

If the future is to be bright for workers, as well as the planet, technological innovation’s impact on people within the supply chain must be monitored closely. If it isn’t, the heaviest blow will be dealt to workers in garment factories around the world.

Today, the disparity between the industry’s highest earners and lowest earners is massive. The CEO of a top-five fashion brand can earn a Bangladeshi garment worker’s lifetime pay in four days.

In our world, anything not fully circular poisons our small plant. Technology offers solutions, but leadership sets the speed of progress and adoption.

In fact, circularity is going to be the application that will constrain the fashion industry to an appropriate scale. Now, six out of ten garments we produce end up in a landfill or are incinerated within the first year of production.