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![]() ![]() The crux of the problem lies in the fashion industry's penchant to overproduce clothes, which goes hand-in-hand with a Western culture that encourages constant consumerism. I cannot with full integrity tell you there is an ethical way to donate your clothing,” says Ricketts. Ricketts says that, in Ghana, about 40 percent of the bales of donated clothes are thrown out. In Ghana, all of the imported, donated excess has been dubbed obroni wawu or "dead white man's clothes," which comes from the idea that a person would have to die to give up so many clothes. In Ghana, all of the imported, donated excess has been dubbed obroni wawu or "dead white man's clothes." The numbers also vary depending on where waste is being measured, but the bottom line is that a lot of clothing ends up trashed. Wicker notes the discrepancy is likely because of Goodwill and the Salvation Army's larger size and more advanced infrastructure to process clothing, like sending donations to their outlet stores. The rest will likely end up in a landfill.Īlden Wicker, a journalist who reports on sustainable fashion, found in 2016 that some organizations actually sell more than that, with Goodwill at about 30 percent and the Salvation Army at 45 to 75 percent sell-through rates. Thrift stores typically only resell about 20 percent of donated garments, according to the Council for Textile Recycling. And once they get there, they may not even be sold. Something a lot of people don't know is that, when you clean out your closet and donate or sell your clothes to places like Plato's Closet or Buffalo Exchange, it's likely your clothes end up being sent abroad. (For now, Ricketts has this website, a multimedia research project looking at the second-hand clothing market in Accra.) Her U.S.-based foundation has worked in Ghana since 2009 and aims to challenge consumer behavior by educating people on the fashion industry. Kantamanto is Ghana's largest secondhand clothing market, and possibly the biggest in West Africa, according to Rickett's nonprofit the OR Foundation, whose website will be up and running soon. There, she's spent the bulk of her time in the Kantamanto Market in Accra, Ghana's capital. ![]() The fashion designer and cofounder of the University of Cincinnati's Sustainable Fashion Initiative (a zero-waste effort within the university's fashion program) has spent years shuttling between the U.S. Liz Ricketts has seen where some of your donated used clothes end up. ![]()
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