IDH, through its Alternate Materials Accelerator Program, has joined forces with Reverse Resources to collaboratively address the challenge of textile and apparel waste in India’s fashion/textile industry.
As global consumption surges, the lifespan of clothing is diminishing. Currently, around 56 million tons of clothing are produced and purchased annually, with projections indicating a rise to 160 million tons by 2050[1]. Shockingly, less than 1% [2]of this is recycled into new clothes, leading to a significant environmental impact. This waste either ends up in landfills or is incinerated, contributing to higher emissions and pushing us further away from achieving net-zero targets.
While innovative solutions and enabling technologies have been developed in recent years, industry stakeholders face challenges in navigating this landscape. The Alternate Materials Accelerator Program has emerged with a clear goal: to work collaboratively with key industry players and close the loop on textile and apparel waste in the country. Our partnership with Reverse Resources to scale their presence and business activities in India is one of the cornerstones of this endeavor.
Reverse Resources provides a subscription-based SaaS (Service as a Solution) traceability platform. This platform facilitates connections between demand and supply needs, enabling brands to map their supply chain, create transparency in waste movement, and establish a verifiable source of recycled material from origin to recycler. By identifying aggregation points and addressing supply bottlenecks, the platform enhances the formalization of the supply chain, provides and strengthens data insights, and facilitates learnings from and for the textile industry.
The project’s scope includes onboarding 10 brands, 520 factories, 65 recyclers and waste handlers, and engaging around 3500 factory workers. The goal is to trace approximately 50,000 metric tonnes of segregated waste from its source to the recycler by 2025.
In partnership with Reverse Resources, we aim to leverage traceability as a catalyst for transforming business practices within the textile sector. This collaboration seeks to accelerate engagement in India by working closely with brands and supply chains, ensuring robust market linkages. Furthermore, we intend to secure public sector support through ongoing dialogues with the Ministry of Textiles, Government of India, and industry associations while sharing insights gained from the project.
[1] https://cleanclothes.org/climate-change#:~:text=By%202050%20this%20figure%20is,utilisation%20rates%20have%20dropped%20significantly.
[2] https://ec.europa.eu/research-and-innovation/en/horizon-magazine/latest-trend-keeps-clothes-out-landfill