Making most of pre-consumer waste

Bangladesh is producing an estimated 400,000 tonnes of pre-consumer textile waste annually. Currently, this waste is collected in an informal manner. Calls for recycling waste and turning it into finished apparels has been growing for sometime but in the absence of a holistic approach that would look at the various means of setting up a systematic supply chain for collection of this waste has thus far been missing. In a recent dialogue titled "Switch to Upstream Circulatory Dialogue: Pre-Consumer Textile Waste in Bangladesh', experts, stakeholders, policymakers and manufacturers came together to discuss the various problems and possibilities of turning waste to value-added products for export. As stated by the chairman of Policy Exchange Bangladesh "Enabling a legal framework, Bangladesh needs to set some mandatory or legal framework for collecting waste to develop an ecosystem for industrial scale, as at this moment it is overwhelming in an informal way." 

Pre-consumer waste comprises fibres, yarn and fabrics that are discarded during production. Such waste is generated from cutting and sewing of fabrics to fit garment dimensions. It also results from overproduction, mistakes in garment assembly or design. One study by Cookling found that up to 15 per cent of fabric is wasted in RMG manufacturing, while other studies put the wastage at much higher levels. According to international media reports, major brands are overburdened with overflowing stocks that cannot be sold for various reasons. These new, but unsold apparels are treated as waste because brands wish to destroy them instead of selling them at discount prices which would de-value their company earnings. The problems with such practices of course are multifarious. First, the net input in resources that go into the manufacture of billions of dollars worth of apparels is wasted. Then the incineration of such bulk goods (or dumping in landfills) adds to environmental pollution. Those same conditions hold true for Bangladesh.

Recycling is the ideal way to reduce waste. Obviously this is not a straightforward process because it involves designing ways on how to collect and appropriately sort garments according to their composition. The recycling of RMG is both a chemical and mechanical process. Experts contend that chemical recycling is more efficient than mechanical, "the process disintegrates fibres to polymer grade through chemical dissolving. This method preserves the fibres more than mechanical shredding and allows for a higher percentage of recycled fibres to be used in garment reproduction." Ultimately which process can be used in the Bangladesh context will depend on local conditions but the technology for recycling exists today.

While numerous examples were highlighted in the event, ranging from the Netherlands to China, about how these countries are going to implement plans for a circular economy, Bangladesh is yet to incorporate these ideas into its national plans. This naturally has to change, as the country is among the top three readymade garments (RMG) manufacturing countries in the world. Today, with some 400,000 tonnes of pre-consumer textile waste being produced by the RMG sector, only about 5.0 per cent is recycled locally and a massive 35 per cent is incinerated in boilers or ending up in landfills. That is a colossal loss of resources. 

According to the Bangladesh Garments Manufacturers Association (BGMEA), along with financial support from banks, regulatory support from the authorities concerned in the form of a waiver of the 7.5 per cent and 15 per cent VAT now imposed on local mills that produce fibre and yarn can turn waste into valuable RMG raw materials. All these supports must come under some sort of regulatory framework because there exists an opportunity of generating more than US$5.0 billion through export of garments made from recycled yarn and fabric.

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