A new report has revealed Ireland is among the top 10 countries exporting fashion waste into Kenya.
According to the ‘Trashion’ report by Cleanup Kenya, an advocate group for sustainable public sanitation, and Wildlight for the Changing Markets Foundation (CMF), 150 million items of clothing are sent abroad from the EU, with the intent of being donated or recycled, but one third end up being dumped in rivers and landfills.
Today’s fashion industry has become synonymous with overconsumption, a snowballing waste crisis, widespread pollution and the exploitation of workers in global supply chains.
READ MORE: Pensioner shot dead in his Castlebar home had been accused of 65 sex offences
Of the 112 million items of used clothing shipped directly from the EU to Kenya each year, up to one in three contain plastic and are of such a low quality that they are immediately dumped in the environment or burned.
Clean Up Kenya and investigative NGO Wildlight interviewed people and collected evidence on the ground in Kenya to discover what happens to used clothing known locally as mitumba, Euronews reports.
Currently, over two-thirds (69%) of textiles are made from plastic, and this is expected to grow to 73% by 2030.
RTE's Amy Ni Riada visited Nairobi in Kenya to investigate.
RTE’s Amy Ni Riada said: “The banks of the Nairobi river are smothering, piles of clothes, shoes, plastics and glass make it hard to distinguish solid ground from the river, smoke from Nairobi’s cities main dump site Dandora, sits over Korogocho slum.
“Dandora along with many other landfill sites, is the end of the runway for millions of items of second hand clothing, known locally as Mathumba originally exported from Europe.
Founder of Clean Up Kenya, Betterman Simidi, told RTE: “The EU citizens donate this cloth, they think they are doing something worthwhile to help the poor, what happens is cloth are graded, the first grade is sold in Europe, the second grade is brought to Africa, and the global south countries.
“The first grade that isn’t sold in Europe, over time that will become second grade and will come to Africa.”
“22 to 50% brought into the country is actually rubbish, and it can’t be used.”
“It causes airborne sickness, you just need to look at the Kenya rivers, the Nairobi river and see the amount of clothes that are there, it is just sickening to watch.”
The report revealed that over 530,000 items of clothing are exported from Ireland to Kenya every year, with over half deemed as damaged or inappropriate and dumped.
The implementation of the EU textile strategy is an important leverage to put the textile industry on a more circular trajectory and also to hold brands and retailers accountable for their textile waste.
John Bosco Khaleesa is Director of the East African Business Council, he told RTE: “Mathumba is the affordable and cheaper type of clothing, it is important that countries do import, they generate income, and also government gets revenue from Mathumba, our textile sector is underdeveloped, there is the port of Mombasa, one of the busiest ports in East Africa"
"Kenya is geographically position, Kenya is a transport hub and that is why most products are passing through Kenya."
The EABC and Cleanup Kenya agreed that the economy can’t afford to ban mitumba (clothing) Mitumba is a Swahili term, literally meaning "bundles", used to refer to plastic-wrapped packages of used clothing donated by people in wealthy countries altogether.
In 2018, Rwanda imposed heavy tariffs on imports of used clothing in a bid to boost the local textile industry.
The upcoming revision of the Waste Framework Directive should introduce a well-designed Extended Producer Responsibility with mandatory eco-design requirements, which will hold fashion companies accountable for the end-of-life of the products they put on the market
Cleanup Kenya founder Betterman Simidi thinks a ban would be an option, he said the EU needs to take better responsibility to protect African nations from becoming the dumping ground for the West’s unwanted wastes.
He told RTE: “It’s very insulting, it’s very disturbing, we see this as intentional West colonialism, the recycling companies are sending this rubbish clothing into our country, they can do better, with quality control, better sorting, in the long term we are suggesting that the EU need to come up with a responsibility scheme for textiles, so that fashion brands can be responsible for the end of life for their clothing they bring to the market.”
Green MEP Ciaran Cuff: “We are already taking action with the eco design directives that’s under discussion in the EU parliament, that will stop the use of a lot of materials that can’t be recycled.
"Some of the polyesters that can’t be recycled or reused, I think that will make a huge difference that waste does not end up in Kenya and other countries.”
Polyester, the darling of the fast fashion industry, is found in over half of all textiles and production is projected to skyrocket in the future
A clean up volunteer told RTE: “You see the cloths made of polyester, if a fire starts, polyester would make that worse, anything plastic burns worse than the other cloths, fire generates very fast and we’ve lost a number of young people because of those fires.”
Some used clothing sellers say that the report paints a "wildly inaccurate" picture of the mitumba trade in Kenya.
Teresia Wairimu, chair of the Mitumba Consortium Association of Kenya, Teresia Wairimu told The Irish Mirror:
“This completely inaccurate and patronising report by the Changing Markets Foundation, attributed in the report to Clean Up Kenya, paints a wildly inaccurate portrait of second-hand clothes (mitumba) in Kenya that none of us recognises.
“This European report assumes that mitumba traders in Kenya spend their money importing up to 50% waste. There is no point in us doing this, we are not fools who somehow pay the Kenyan government $15k per 40ft container in taxes for importing waste just to dump into landfills."
"We are proud business people who buy good quality sorted clothes that can be sold and re-used in Kenya."
“At least 2 million Kenyans are directly employed by the second-hand clothes (mitumba) industry, which is 10% of the entire Kenyan workforce. Over 24 million people buy second-hand clothes in Kenya, with the majority of those totally reliant on them for their clothes each year."
“This report is demeaning and an insult to all who work in the second-hand clothes trade across the continent and by spreading misinformation it further threatens millions of livelihoods."
READ NEXT:
Chaotic forecast shows heavy snow as temperatures plummet amid multiple warnings
Louis Walsh denies Keith Duffy 'can't sing' jibe when introducing him to Bono
Cabinet to approve new tech to bring down drones after Dublin Airport upheaval
Gardaí rush to scene as 'multiple gunshots' fired at van in Irish town
Thousands tune out of RTE's Late Late and Tommy Tiernan Shows in ratings blow
Get breaking news to your inbox by signing up to our newsletter
