May 21, 2021

The Director of the Maresme Waste Consortium, member of the Technical Commission of the Pact for Circular Fashion in Catalonia

by MaresmeCircular in Consortium

On Thursday 13th May the first plenary session of the Pact for Circular Fashion in Catalonia took place. An initiative that is promoted by the Catalan Government’s Departments of Business and Knowledge and Territory and Sustainability, and in which the director of the Maresme Waste Consortium, Carles Salesa, participates as a member of the Technical Commission.

With the aim of tackling the problem of textile waste in Catalonia, the Pact aims to respond to the challenges of sustainable development in a coordinated manner between all the agents in the sector’s value chain. Now, after two years of work, the Pact for Circular Fashion in Catalonia has materialised in the form of a working group. The goal is clear: to contribute to changing the paradigm of the textile sector and move towards a voluntary, shared and collaborative circular economy, establishing common objectives and generating instruments that make this transformation possible.

It should be remembered that the problem of textile waste is global. In the last fifteen years alone, the sale of textile pieces has doubled, and they have an increasingly short lifespan. Unfortunately, reuse and recycling are not progressing at the same pace. Above all because the products in this sector are not designed for this purpose. In Catalonia alone, each person consumes between 21.5 and 26 kg of textiles per year and only 12% of textile waste is collected selectively. This percentage is a far cry from that of other waste fractions. This means that the vast majority of textile waste from household consumption, a total of 140,000 t/year, is either recovered for energy or sent to landfill.

Among other things, the Pact aims to significantly reduce the generation of textile waste and increase the percentage of selective collection and material recovery, both in terms of preparation for reuse and recycling. Likewise, in the field of manufacturing, the objectives are to increase the durability of products, raise the percentage of recycled material incorporated into new products, reduce and eliminate the use of harmful materials, increase reuse with the implementation of new business models, and deploy strategies for cleaner and more efficient production.