Home >

Old Clothes Market: How Can China Break Through The 100 Billion Old Clothes Industry Chain?

2021/7/1 14:40:00 0

LetClothesPlayMaximumValueChinaHow To Break Through100 Billion

Suppose that, on average, every Chinese will buy 10 pieces of new clothes a year, of which 3-5 pieces will be discarded. Every year, 4-7 billion pieces of clothes will be discarded, about 50 million tons. Where will the huge amount of old clothes go? What kind of value can it produce?

The first stop may be the second-hand trading of idle fish. The C2C business volume is small, the transaction is uncertain, and the value generated is uncertain. However, no matter how much the value is, it is completed between two people, so it does not have extensive market liquidity, so it is not included for the moment.

The second stop, maybe the garbage can. And any "trash" in the bin will be sorted, and clothes may be no exception. But first, most of them will be burned, and second, even if they are disposed of, it will cost more to turn waste into treasure.

The third stop is recycling old clothes. According to the standards of the used clothes recycling industry, the old clothes that have not been sorted and selected are collectively referred to as "unified goods". The prices of unified goods for summer clothes range from 3900 yuan to 6300 yuan per ton, and those for winter clothes range from 500 yuan to 900 yuan per ton.

  

After being collected, old clothes will go through transportation, cleaning, disinfection, ironing, and then be classified, packed, transported and sold at a low price

So what is the value of 50 million tons? In the field of clothing, the recycling of used clothes is supporting a huge market with a scale of 100 billion.

In fact, the old clothes recycling is a long-standing, complete and well-defined industrial chain. After the old clothes are recycled, they are transported, cleaned, disinfected, ironed, transported across the country, and sold at a low price. Thus, an old garment realizes its second value realization from the counter or online window.

  

According to the trade data obtained from the official website of the United Nations, in 2018, the global total import volume of second-hand clothing reached 4.1 billion US dollars, of which the African market absorbed 1.3 billion US dollars. This means that more than one-third of the world's second-hand clothing is eventually imported to Africa. But where do these clothes come from?

In the early 20th century, Britain, the United States, Germany, Japan and other countries adopted laws to support and encourage the recycling of waste textiles. According to the textile recycling association of the United Kingdom, China's second-hand clothing exports accounted for less than 1% of the world in 2010, and rose by 6.4% in 2015. Many of them go to Africa. British supply accounted for a quarter of used clothing shipped to Kenya over the past decade. Today, China is the largest supplier, accounting for about 30%.

  

The increasing export volume of the world's major exporters of second-hand clothing

As a country with a large population, China does occupy a large proportion of second-hand clothing exporting countries, but in fact, the United States, the United Kingdom, Germany and South Korea are the real early movers in the field of used clothes recycling. Less than 10% of China's discarded clothing is recycled every year.

China's used clothes recycling industry, whose recovery rate is less than 10%, is still in its early stage.

On the one hand, China's used clothing recycling industry system is quite complete, the upstream and downstream layout is reasonable, and the division of labor is clear. Nearly 30% of the used clothes will be exported to Africa, Southeast Asia and other regions, with Africa accounting for the highest proportion. In 2018, when the global total import of second-hand clothing reached 4.1 billion US dollars, China exported $280 million of used clothing, of which more than 70% were sold to the African market. The remaining 70% will be recycled in the domestic market. For a certain category or industrial chain of the used clothes industry, many professional recycling centers have been formed independently to cooperate with it.

On the other hand, although the old clothes recycling industry is booming in recent years, it is still in the underground industrial chain. According to the data provided by tianyancha, the number of enterprises engaged in the used clothing industry increased from 262 in 2016 to 359 in 2017, 569 in 2018, 830 in November 2019, and 261 more. Today, in the Tianyan search of used clothes recycling related enterprises, the number has been updated to: 1097.

Real time data update of old clothes recycling platform by flying ants

Some of the more mature enterprises and organizations, such as "little yellow dog" in the community, or flying ant, white whale, ouyan, dangdangdang, which make used clothes recycling online, and make online booking and free collection through online platforms such as Alipay, Xianyu and Jingdong. After these old clothes are recycled, there will be four major flows: export resale (accounting for the highest proportion, up to 70%) Environmental protection regeneration (20%), donation from mountain areas and process reengineering.

However, in addition to registered used clothes recycling enterprises, there are still a large number of individuals and donation only organizations engaged in the old clothes recycling business.

  

In order to let the underground industry go into the sunshine, we should first correct its name.

When we advocate and practice sustainability, how can we make use of the commodities that are not very sustainable so that they can become slightly sustainable? It takes a long time for non degradable fiber to decompose suddenly, and air pollution will be produced by incineration.

  

Emission reduction accounting of used clothes recycling scenario

About 26 million tons of used clothes are thrown into the trash every year in China, according to the China Recycling Economy Association. If these old clothes are burned, it will cause waste and pollution; Landfill will affect the soil. According to the data of the Allen MacArthur Foundation, the clothing industry accounts for about 10% of the total global carbon emissions, more than the total carbon emissions of the aviation and shipping industries. For every kilogram of clothing recycled, 3.6 kilograms of carbon dioxide can be reduced, 6000 liters of water, 0.3 kilograms of fertilizer and 0.2 kilograms of pesticides can be saved.

  

UNIQLO's "all goods recycling" campaign

In fact, old clothes recycling is an important way to release the pressure of fashion industry. On the one hand, the second-hand clothing trade helps to prevent the excess inventory of the fashion industry from being directly thrown into landfills; On the other hand, consumers will eliminate the old clothes accumulated in the wardrobe all year round and buy new clothes, so as to digest the new products created by brands. Therefore, as early as 2006, UNIQLO launched the "recycling of all commodities" campaign, which recycles its own brand clothing free of charge to consumers for re wearing, fiber material recycling or energy treatment.

Such a huge value of the industrial chain, the future is worth more brands to join and use.

Supply side reform, consumption upgrading, and manufacturing transformation, when the world is striving to move forward, new products come out of the assembly line and enter the shopping malls every day, and the old products are eliminated every day. What is the final destination of the eliminated products?

Scientific and efficient recycling of old clothes, so that each piece of clothing has the maximum value, is a beautiful vision. However, from the enterprise side, there are more opportunities for making efforts. In the past few decades, recycling was mostly offline, including government public welfare organizations, waste recycling stations, recycling bins, and even bell ringing mobile recycling. Today, the Internet has turned it into an online business. In the future, based on the support of science and technology and digital empowerment, can the link after collection of old clothes be more intelligent, efficient and energy-saving, so as to achieve maximum resource saving, environmental coordination and sustainable development?

This is a 100 billion track, and it is also a green industry that needs to reconstruct the base facilities construction in the modern business context.

  • Related reading

Speed Up The Development Of New Business Forms And Models Of Foreign Trade

Market topics
|
2021/7/1 14:38:00
0

Interpretation: The Purchasing Manager Index Of China'S Manufacturing Industry Was Basically Flat In June

Market topics
|
2021/6/30 19:32:00
0

The Construction Of Textile And Garment Big Data Center Is Accelerating In This Field

Market topics
|
2021/6/29 1:23:00
0

Analysis Of China'S Clothing Export In The First Five Months

Market topics
|
2021/6/28 16:12:00
1

Jiangsu Center And Henan Center Of China Textile And Garment Big Data Center

Market topics
|
2021/6/28 15:43:00
2
Read the next article

626 China'S Fashion Brands Live Broadcast

On June 26, under the guidance of the China Textile Industry Federation and supported by the Department of industry and information technology of Henan Province, the Department of finance of Henan Province and the Rural Revitalization Bureau of Henan Province, China