Measuring Sustainability in the Indian Fashion Industry

This is a methodological study undertaken to pretest a survey instrument. A structured questionnaire was designed to measure the extent of sustainability practices followed by Indian fashion designer wear firms. Multi-method pretesting of the questionnaire was conducted to remove biases arising from low-quality data. Questions were reviewed using the Question Understanding Aid (QUAID) to check wording, syntax, and semantics, and eleven experts were consulted to check for burden, sensitivity, social undesirability, and potential for response failure. Reviewers generally agreed on non-problematic items, particularly regarding burden, and when identifying potentially problematic items, reviewers rated questions using their varied disciplinary backgrounds. Communication questions had fewer response quality issues, except for sensitivity. Biodiversity questions were more prone to social undesirability and response failure, making accurate responses challenging. Financial questions were highly sensitive but otherwise moderate in response quality. A pilot study with thirty respondents tested data completeness and consistency before a complete survey with ninety respondents. Using qualitative financial indicators reduced nonresponse rates. The study contributes to the literature on structured questionnaire development to measure the extent of environmental sustainability in the Indian fashion industry.