What’s happening?
Quick trend manufacturers are selling circularity, however actuality exhibits that that is nonetheless a fable. Nowhere is the failure of the quick trend linear enterprise mannequin extra seen than within the international locations the place many of those low cost garments find yourself as soon as their quick lives are over: on enormous dump websites, burnt on open fires, alongside riverbeds and washed out into the ocean, with extreme penalties for folks and the planet.
I went on a analysis journey to Kenya and Tanzania to witness the issue of imported textile waste in these international locations. You may learn the findings within the new “Poisoned Presents” briefing launched by Greenpeace Germany.
Why it issues
When folks donate their used garments to a charity, deliver them to a take-back field at a model’s retailer, or to a municipal recycling station, they could assume that they are going to be offered for a superb trigger at a charity thrift retailer, or shall be recycled into new garments.
The truth is, that solely a small quantity (about 10 to 30 %) is definitely resold within the nation the place the garments have been collected. Some are downcycled into decrease grade merchandise like rags, and greater than half of them are exported for “reuse”, largely to East and West Africa and Japanese Europe.
A better look
To seek out out extra about what occurs to those used and exported garments, I went to go to two of the highest 5 world internet importers: Kenya and Tanzania. I realized that in these international locations, imported second-hand garments are generally known as “Mitumba”, a Kiswahili phrase that means bale or bundle, as a result of they’re usually offered to retailers in bales. Mitumba is related for many individuals and the economic system in Kenya and Tanzania.
However after I was speaking to distributors at Gikomba market, in Nairobi, they instructed me that lately they’re usually dissatisfied after they open the bales, as a result of almost half of the garments are unusable and don’t have any market worth: their high quality is simply too poor, or they’re damaged or dirty and are nothing greater than textile waste.
![Fast Fashion Research in Tanzania. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace Fast Fashion Research in Tanzania. Mitumba Market Mbauda in Arusha, Tanzania. When opening a bale of second-hand clothes the tension is high: is the content good enough to be sold again or is a lot of it just textile waste? © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace](https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-international-stateless/2022/04/223116f7-gp1sx9id-1024x684.jpg)
So it seems that the World North has discovered a backdoor to do away with its textile waste downside by the export of used garments to international locations of the World South, forcing them to cope with the implications of quick trend, although they don’t have any infrastructure to take action.
Strolling down from the Gikomba market to the Nairobi River, I used to be shocked to search out I used to be actually strolling on textile waste which was piling up alongside the river banks, falling into the water and flowing downstream.
![Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. Gikoba market in Nairobi: the ground is covered with layers of textile waste. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace](https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-international-stateless/2022/04/d9aac2c5-gp1sxb8f-1024x684.jpg)
Within the night some folks burnt footwear and textiles on open fires to attempt to cope with the issue, and my eyes began burning from the polluted air. This smoke adversely impacts folks’s well being dwelling within the space.
![Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. The Nairobi River which runs through Gikomba market is clogged up with textile waste. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace](https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-international-stateless/2022/04/d2fc22fe-gp1sxadw-1024x684.jpg)
The ever rising overproduction of quick trend has led to rising quantities of used clothes being exported from the World North to the World South. In 2019 Kenya imported 185,000 tonnes of second-hand garments and with about 30 to 40 % of Mitumba having no market worth, which means that 55 500 – 74 000 tonnes was truly textile waste. Every single day about 150 to 200 tonnes of textile waste – between 60 to 75 truckloads – finally ends up dumped, burnt, or despatched to overflowing dump websites like Dandora.
![Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. A truck filled with waste is unloaded at the Dandora dumpsite in Nairobi, Kenya. This dumpsite was already deemed full in 2001, but is still being used today. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace](https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-international-stateless/2022/04/84c6944b-gp1sxbbb-1024x683.jpg)
What we’re saying about it
The quick trend pattern has turned garments into throwaway objects like disposable packaging. To cease the stream of textile waste being dumped on the World South, there isn’t a method round massively slowing down quick trend. World trend manufacturers have to fully change their linear enterprise fashions and begin producing fewer garments which can be designed to be higher high quality, longer lasting, repairable and reusable.
![Fast Fashion Research in Kenya. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace A beautiful carpet woven out of used jeans by the Kenyan organisation Africa Collects Textiles. The Global North can learn from the designers, Mitumba traders, upcyclers and waste pickers in East Africa how to value and take care of clothes already in the system. © Kevin McElvaney / Greenpeace](https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-international-stateless/2022/04/2d4757a2-gp1sxbbo-1024x684.jpg)
As well as, there must be a shift away from the neocolonial attitudes of World North international locations in the direction of these within the World South, which impose buying and selling practices primarily useful for the World North. This successfully turns World South international locations into dumping grounds for quick trend waste, whereas doing little or nothing to assist or develop the clear manufacturing of native textiles and garment manufacturing that’s wanted in these international locations, utilizing the identical excessive requirements and finest practices which can be required in Europe.
What must occur
These surprising footage of large quantities of textile waste polluting the surroundings clearly reveal that it’s not sufficient for world trend manufacturers to solely deal with cleansing up their provide chains. Greenpeace is urging them to step up their efforts to cease the massive end-of-life impacts of their merchandise.
Just lately the brand new EU textile technique was launched, which incorporates some necessary steps, equivalent to a plan to ban the export of textile waste and promote lengthy lasting, sturdy and repairable clothes. It is a good begin, however to successfully cease the ever rising devastating results of quick trend on folks and the surroundings, regulation of the style business must be established internationally by a worldwide treaty.
Viola Wohlgemuth is a Round economic system and Toxics Campaigner at Greenpeace Germany.