Countless used textiles are sent to countries in the South, particularly Kenya, every year, where much of it ends up in open landfills. “A large proportion (…) consists of articles made from synthetic fibres,” according to the Changing Markets Foundation, which in a report on Thursday February 16 points to a situation “fueled by the growing production of cheap synthetic clothing by Marche North “.
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The organization offers an estimate of this ecological catastrophe, the result of a survey called “Trashion”, a neologism composed of “trash” (garbage) and “fashion” (fashion). According to these calculations, of the more than 900 million used garments (including 150 million from the European Union and the United Kingdom) shipped to Kenya in 2021, “an estimated 458 million used garments are unusable waste and 307 million of those are likely plastic fibres contain”.
The work carried out by Changing Markets in September 2022 is based in particular on customs and import-export data. It is accompanied by field work by the non-profit organization Wildlight and the association Clean Up Kenya, who have collected more than 80 interviews with Kenyan merchants and traveled to important locations such as the Dandora landfill site just outside Nairobi where tons of garbage are piling up.
plastic pollution
“The effects of soil, water and air pollution are significant,” notes Changing Markets. The organization also highlights the testimonies of Kenyans working in the second-hand trade, who speak of their poverty wages and the risk to their health, particularly from inhaling the fumes of burning synthetic clothing.
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For Changing Markets, “Western countries are using the second-hand trade as a pressure relief valve to deal with the enormous problem of fast fashion waste”. In particular, the Foundation recommends the use of non-toxic and sustainable materials and the development of Extended Producer Responsibility sectors – which already exist in France. She also recalled that the Basel Convention prohibits the export of waste to countries that do not have the appropriate reprocessing capacity.