IMPORTED clothes from international fast fashion brands, or ones that quickly make clothes in vogue to keep up with trends, including Zara, Mango, H&M and Forever 21, found their names on a blacklist made public by China’s quality watchdog Wednesday.

    Zara and Mango, the Spanish retail giants, Sweden’s H&M and Forever 21 of the United States topped the list of companies who failed quality control tests conducted by the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine of China in the first half of this year.

    A total of 12,305 cases of substandard clothing were found by authorities between January and June, it said.

    Among these, 396 cases were related to safety problems. The four aforementioned brands accounted for 27.02 percent of the cases, the administration said.

    The administration did not specify which quality safety problems were found regarding the products. However, it said that mistaken or missing Chinese labels were cited in more than 97 percent of the 12,305 cases. The products being questioned have a combined market value of US$47.67 million.

    Most substandard clothing products were found to have been made in Italy, Vietnam, South Korea and Bangladesh.

    An excessive PH index was the major problem found in imported infants’ clothing, which could lead to skin problems, it said.

    Fast fashion brands, known for their fast-changing styles of products, quick manufacturing processes and affordable prices, have been frequently entangled in quality problems since 2011.

    The United States’ Gap, Spain’s Zara, Germany’s C&A, and Sweden’s H&M are the four most successful clothing retailers in the world.

    (SD-Agencies)