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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
World
Fleur Britten

Fast-fashion giant Shein pledges $15m for textile waste workers in Ghana

Unsellable secondhand clothes rot on a dumpsite in Accra, Ghana.
Unsellable secondhand clothes rot on a dumpsite in Accra, Ghana. Photograph: Muntaka Chasant/REX/Shutterstock

Chinese fashion behemoth Shein might be the organisation least expected to win applause at an international conference on fashion sustainability, but that’s what happened at this week’s global fashion summit in Copenhagen.

The industry’s largest forum for sustainable progress saw the ultra-fast fashion brand praised for making a donation of $15m (£12m) over three years to a charity working at Kantamanto in Accra, the world’s largest secondhand clothing market.

Liz Ricketts, director of the Or Foundation, a Ghana- and US-based not-for-profit working with Accra’s textile waste workers, announced the fund, tearfully telling the audience that the workers are doing “backbreaking” work.

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