T E X T I L E I N D U S T R Y N E W S O N R E U S E , R E C Y C L I N G A N D C I R C U L A R I T Y

EU TARGETS DESTROYED UNSOLD PRODUCTS

Over 20% of textiles placed on the EU market go unsold

As the EU moves to ban the destruction of unsold textiles and footwear, new evidence is putting numbers on a long-hidden problem. There is something uniquely maddening about the idea of a product being thrown away before anyone has even used it. Not worn out, not broken, not obsolete. Just unsold. Yet this is happening at scale across Europe’s consumer economy, across multiple product categories. A new study from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) estimates that around 21 percent of textiles placed on the EU market are left unsold, and that roughly half of those unsold textiles are ultimately destroyed.

FULL STORY HERE

As the EU moves to ban the destruction of unsold textiles and footwear, new evidence is putting numbers on a long-hidden problem. There is something uniquely maddening about the idea of a product being thrown away before anyone has even used it. Not worn out, not broken, not obsolete. Just unsold. Yet this is happening at scale across Europe’s consumer economy, across multiple product categories. A new study from the European Commission’s Joint Research Centre (JRC) estimates that around 21 percent of textiles placed on the EU market are left unsold, and that roughly half of those unsold textiles are ultimately destroyed.

FULL STORY HERE

One simple code that defines the future of textile circularity

Second-hand clothing is not only a question of consumption or charity, but increasingly of trade governance: who gets to define what counts as a product, what becomes waste, and which textile flows are allowed to move across borders. Right now, one of the most important bottlenecks for circular textile trade sits in something as technical as a customs number.

February 10, 2026

How Kenya and Ghana became the centre of Europe’s second-hand debate

Europe’s debate over textile waste and circularity is increasingly framed around responsibility: what happens to unwanted clothing once it leaves EU borders, and who bears the economic and environmental cost of overproduction. Yet the countries most often placed at the centre of this debate are not European. They are Kenya and Ghana.

The global fight over how to define second-hand clothing intensifies

Second hand clothing has long been treated as something informal. A social good, a thrift economy, a circular alternative to buying new. Now it is moving into a very different world: trade compliance and regulatory classification.

This week, a UN-backed study supported by the European Union is set to receive renewed attention as it is formally highlighted at an OECD policy forum on 10 February.

February 5, 2026

When is a T-shirt waste? How global textile flows can be redrawn

As regulators move to tighten controls on global textile waste, the recycling and reuse industry is pushing back. At the centre of the dispute is a deceptively simple question with far-reaching consequences: when does a used garment become waste, and when is it still a product?

January 26, 2026

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The elusive truth behind the second-hand export debate | Part 1

The amazing story about the mountains of textile waste in Ghana. Mountains that doesn´t exist, but nevertheless have been broadcasted all around the world as a major problem. Unfortunately these claims has also influenced policymakers and politicians within the EU, which has led to new regulations that actually threatens the circular system of clothes.