More than 50% of people in Latvia buy new clothes at least once every three months or more often, but only a third of people put their used clothes in textile sorting containers. Encouraging to find solutions to reduce textile waste in Latvia and to ensure a clear regulatory framework for further development of the separate textile collection system, today, on 29 March, environmental management company Eco Baltia vide Ltd and Latvijas Zaļais punkts launched the "Style-textiles" campaign. And, in the very centre of Riga, on the Esplanade, there is an impressive environmental installation called "Style Alley", which aims to encourage people to sort textiles and to show that it is only one step from stylish clothes to textile waste.
The European Union (EU) requires all Member States to have a single system for sorting and collecting textiles by 2025. Due to the high level of interest, the Latvian Waste Management Law requires that separate collection of textiles should be ensured from 2023. However, a clear regulatory framework defining the responsibilities of stakeholders in textile management to promote recycling and recycling has not yet been developed and adopted. At the moment, infrastructure development is mainly driven by environmental management companies and the costs are also borne by them.
"The National Waste Management Plan 2021-2028 sets as overarching objectives both reduction of the overall volume of waste and the volume of waste to be landfilled, and increase in waste reuse and recycling. The objectives set call for careful work to develop the separate waste collection system in order to obtain the best possible quality of resource to create products with higher added value. This would prevent from paying to the EU for poor waste management practices. Textile waste is one of the household waste streams for which separate collection will help achieve the targets. It is important that the separate collection of this waste is understood and motivated by our society. It is therefore very important that we have started this separate collection of waste earlier than required by EU rules", stresses Mr Māris Sprindžuks, Minister for Environmental Protection and Regional Development.
In order to promote more sustainable textile management and the established textile sorting in Latvia, the LLC (SIA) “Eco Baltia vide” in cooperation with Latvijas Zaļais punkts launched a textile sorting pilot project back in 2019, deploying the first 20 containers. Due to the high level of interest, the container network has been continuously expanded and currently consists of more than 170 containers. But to collect even a quarter of the amount of textiles placed on the Latvian market, at least 600-800 sorting points need to be set up, sorting capacities need to be significantly increased and the textile lifecycle - reuse, conversion and recycling - needs to be developed, including in Latvia. This requires changes in legislation to clearly define the responsibilities of the parties and to reinforce the “polluter pays” principle, as in the management of hazardous waste and packaging, for example.
Mr Jānis Aizbalts, Chairman of the Board of the LLC (SIA) “Eco Baltia vide”:
"We have invested around 0.5 euro million in research and infrastructure for a textile sorting system in Latvia within the timespan of three years. We have seen how important this system is in reducing the amount of waste that is disposed of and how much people appreciate the opportunity to sort their unwanted clothes and take them to the special separate collection points. In 2022, more than 1,500 tonnes of clothing, shoes and home textiles were placed in our special containers, representing 50% over the indicator of the previous year. But it has only been our own initiative to promote it. If the country is committed to having a separate collection system in Latvia from the beginning of this year, it is absurd that the government has not yet been able to develop and agree on the regulatory framework, including a "polluter pays" principle. Ensuring environmental sustainability and reducing the volume of waste going to landfill is not just a task for the waste industry, but fundamentally a shared societal need and challenge. Given the limited recycling capacity for textile waste, the system is comparatively expensive to maintain and manage, so it is urgent to understand how we will further sustain and develop it."
Residents also feel that infrastructure is still inadequate and needs to be further developed. 71% of respondents* in Latvia indicate that they would be more active in sorting textiles if sorting containers were available close to where they live. At the same time, awareness of the need to sort is growing: since 2020, the number of people who put unwanted clothes, shoes and home textiles in special textile sorting containers has increased by 12 percentage points, from 21% to 33%.
"Latvia's readiness to implement the new system needs to be seen in two aspects. One is laws and regulations, where we have never gone beyond a commitment. Specific Regulation of the Cabinet of Ministers regulating the operation of such a system and defining the responsibilities and obligations of the parties involved has never been approved by the government. The second aspect is the willingness of people to start sorting textiles. In the survey, 91% of respondents have already expressed their support for the introduction of a separate collection system for textiles, and 33% of the public are already sorting textiles, which shows that participation would increase significantly if the system was further developed", says Kaspars Zakulis, Director of Latvijas Zaļais punkts.
Textiles – clothes, shoes, home textiles, accessories thrown away in household waste – account for 3–5% of the waste sent to landfills every year. Textile production uses around 3,500 chemicals, 750 of which are classified as hazardous to human health and 440 - as hazardous to the environment. Synthetic fibres, which make up 60% of textiles, take around 200 years to decompose. This means that chemicals start spreading into the environment over time, and textiles continue increasing the mountain of landfills. The aim of introducing a textile sorting system in EU countries is to reduce textile waste and the environmental impact of the fashion industry, and to encourage the collection, sorting and recycling of textile waste.
The campaign organisers invite Latvian residents to use the current textile separate collection system provided by waste management companies and to take their sorted clothing, footwear and home textiles to the special textile sorting containers available in many places in Latvia. All the information about textile sorting, answers to frequently asked questions, as well as the addresses of the red textile sorting containers of the LLC (SIA) "Eco Baltia vide" and Latvijas Zaļais punkts are summarised on the campaign website tekstils.lv.
The campaign will also include special "TEXTILE DAYS" on 15 and 16 April, during which mobile textile drop-off points will be placed in several courtyards of apartment buildings in Riga in cooperation with the Riga House Manager.
The campaign is organised by the LLC (SIA) "Eco Baltia vide" and the JSC (AS) "Latvijas Zaļais punkts" in cooperation with RIMI, the "top!" store chain, Reserved and other LPP brands, as well as “Rīgas namu pārvaldnieks”. The campaign is organised within the framework of the LIFE’s integrated project “Waste to Resources Latvia - Boosting Regional Sustainability and Circularity by Introducing the Waste to Resources Concept” (LIFE Waste To Resources IP, LIFE20 IPE/LV/000014), which is implemented with the financial support of the European Union's LIFE Programme of the European Union and the State Regional Development Agency.
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