The bicycle industry has become far more polluting than it used to be. The main reasons for this are the change in production materials and the decline in the quality of spare parts.
About two-thirds of all bicycles produced in the world, or 70 million of the 110 million pairs a year, are made by China. "Chinese companies have no competitors and one of their goals is not to have a bicycle industry anywhere else," says Dr Daniel Mishori, the researcher in Tel Aviv University's Department of Environmental Studies.