The growing proportion of inferior textiles is a problem.
Experts now fear the collapse of the used clothing system.
Munich - It often looks terrible in front of the containers.
What happens to used clothing is a highly complex part of the circular economy - and anything but just garbage.
In Germany, used clothing is collected from commercial, charitable and municipal providers.
These can be easily recognized by seals or imprints on the containers.
What happens to the clothes after they are thrown in, explains Thomas Ahlmann, Managing Director of FairWwertung, the association of non-profit used clothes collectors in Germany: “The containers are set up by individual organizations, such as the Diakonia Munich. The clothing is then sorted and given to those in need free of charge or for a symbolic sum. ”Everything that is left over, because only around two to four percent of clothing can be used for charitable purposes in Germany, is sold to commercial dealers. The proceeds go back to the collecting organization.
The commercial traders are partly organized in the Federal Association for Secondary Raw Materials and Disposal (bvse).
Thomas Fischer speaks for the 100 or so members in the textile recycling department: “We mostly sell the used textiles directly to the sorting companies,” says the engineer.
In addition to Germany, the largest plants for this are in the Netherlands and Poland.
"After that, most of the second-hand goods go to Africa and Eastern Europe."
Because Fischer and Ahlmann agree: The people in the target countries prefer high-quality second-hand clothing to low-quality new goods from Asia.
And that's not a niche phenomenon, according to Ahlmann, 80 percent of the world's population wear second-hand clothing.
But cheaply produced new goods are pushing more and more onto the European market.
Suppliers undercut each other with low prices in order to be able to sell more and more collections per year.
The result: tons of inferior disposable clothing.
And it is not marketable, as Thomas Fischer explains: “Each item of clothing is viewed and assessed individually: is it wearable and is there a market for it?
Even the people who buy second-hand clothes don't want to walk around in a sweater that goes out of shape after the second wash. "
But there are more and more of them: Even now, 20 percent of the clothes collected are so inferior that at best they can be processed into insulating material or painter's fleece, and the trend is rising. So-called foreign and disruptive substances are up to ten percent in a container. "It costs money to dispose of it, which then no longer flows into social projects," annoyed Thomas Ahlmann. And he sees further challenges: “As of 2025, clothing must be collected separately from other rubbish throughout the EU, which will exacerbate the situation.” According to Ahlmann, such considerable quantities of inferior textiles would also end up on the used clothing market.
That is why charitable, municipal and commercial collectors are calling for greater product responsibility for the textile industry: "The problem is not the manufacturers from Europe, they produce the high-quality clothing that finances the collection system," explains Thomas Fischer, "we want the manufacturers that flood the stores with disposable goods, also finance their disposal. ”Otherwise consumers would have to pay for the disposal of their old clothes at some point.
"But that is the very last step for us, we don't collect rubbish, we give clothes a second life, there is no more ecological recycling," emphasizes Thomas Fischer. In addition, there has been no alternative to selling second-hand goods from an ecological point of view, because fiber-to-fiber recycling is still in its infancy, as Thomas Ahlmann explains: “Internationally, less than one percent of old clothes are processed into new clothes, so far it has been worthwhile simply not."
According to an industry expert, 300 euros to 350 euros per ton of unsorted clothing would be an adequate price - currently only 180 euros are achieved in some cases and of this the entire logistics, from the collection container to the sorting system, have to be paid for.
Thomas Ahlmann is certain: "We need a solution for the collection, sorting and recycling of broken or worn textiles by 2025 at the latest - it will not work without additional funding."
Politicians are examining the extended product stewardship, but are still in the process of exploring them, as Susann Krause from the Federal Environment Agency explains: “We are currently examining several instruments to ensure sustainable recycling of used clothing.
We want to have put together an efficient package of measures by 2025 at the latest. "
The solution also lies with the consumers: high-quality clothing packaged weatherproof in plastic bags generates good sales, saves valuable resources and supports charitable causes.