Textile waste created during the garment production process is a largely overlooked environmental issue, growing alongside the expansion of the industry. SEI Tallinn, together with its partners, is supporting the deployment of circular solutions in textile production.
Around the world, textile and garment factories produce massive amounts of clothing. With that production comes waste: offcuts, defective pieces and unused fabric that often go unaccounted for. Some attention is starting to be paid to what happens after consumers discard their clothes – people buy more things second-hand, participate in community clean-ups and share photos or videos of enormous landfills. However, the issue of post-industrial textile waste remains largely ignored.
Traditional clothing manufacturing generates an average of 18% textile waste. However, as the circular economy gains momentum, there is a growing recognition that post-industrial textile waste can be effectively utilized for closed-loop recycling – turning waste into valuable resources. This is especially relevant in Kenya’s textile and garment manufacturing sector, a major contributor to the national economy, employing approximately 80,000 people directly and over 250,000 indirectly.
“The textile industry has been listed as the second most polluting industry after oil and gas. This is a global position,” says Professor Josphat Igadwa Mwasiagi from Moi University. “When we look at Kenya, we find a lot of environmental issues in textile production. We find that the dyes are not treated before being released into the water streams. This is very serious because it seems that the toxic chemicals are ending up in rivers, lakes and other areas.”
“Apart from that, we have a lot of second-hand clothes coming to Kenya, which is a big issue,“ Mwasiagi continues. “We have the Dandora dump site and the Nairobi River, where a lot of second-hand clothes are thrown into, which is a very serious environmental problem.”
The project “Transferring UPMADE know-how to Kenya” (2023–2025) sought to address the environmental impact of textile and garment production in Kenya through an industrial upcycling method known as UPMADE. The system provides practical tools, knowledge and a certification scheme. It was developed by Reet Aus, a sustainable fashion designer and Senior Researcher at the Estonian Academy of Arts, in collaboration with SEI Tallinn.
“The UPMADE system helps factories circulate waste materials back to the production on-site,“ explains Aus. The method enables factories to analyse their waste to identify which materials can be reused. They can then calculate the lifecycle footprint of both their regular and upcycled products.
“It is important to carry out a lifecycle assessment of any given product, so you can know the carbon emissions that are associated with producing that product,” says Zipporah Boto, UPMADE project Research Assistant, Moi University. “Most of the markets that import products require those certifications. It is also a good opportunity to see the renewable materials that can be used and the opportunities in designing [upcycled] products. So that from the onset, you can come up with products that are very durable. And you also make use of the four R-s in textiles: you produce products that can be reused, that are repairable, that can be repurposed and recycled, so that you contribute to the circularity of textiles.”
The project, funded by the Republic of Estonia, focused on one textile factory in Kenya: Rivatex in Eldoret City.
It unfolded in several stages.
At the end of the project, Rivatex was awarded UPMADE certification.
“This is going to add one more product range, which we didn’t have,” explains Stanley Bett, the General Manager of Corporate Services in Rivatex. “Because of that, we are going to see an upward trend in sales because most of these garments are hand-stitched and they have premium prices.“
Experts hope this pilot marks the beginning of a more significant shift toward sustainable textile production in Kenya and globally.
“In the 1970s, Kenya had over 54 functional factories like Rivatex. By 2015, most of them had collapsed and gone bankrupt. As we speak, we have less than ten factories working,” describes Professor Josphat Igadwa Mwasiagi. “The Kenyan industries need to move to a point where they can produce textiles in a competitive manner. As they do that, they should also produce textiles in an environmental manner and in a way that is good for the people.”
Mwasiagi is hopeful for the future: “I believe that in the next 20 years, with projects like this one, Kenya will learn how to handle waste. It means that Kenya is going to be at the forefront of utilizing all the materials that we use. There’ll be no waste. There’ll be nothing going to the Dandora dump site, so there’ll be no problem there. There’ll be no clothes thrown in the Nairobi River. The water that will be coming from the dying factory will be pretreated.”
“This is an exciting time that we are going to have,” he says. “A time in sustainable textile production where the people, the industry and the society at large will be able to survive.”
Going forward, SEI Tallinn and the Estonian Academy of Arts will continue enhancing the UPMADE system – contributing to global efforts to combat textile waste.
Project / The main objective of the project is to implement a value-added upcycling strategy within the Kenyan garment and textile industry.
Other publication / This report presents key findings from the mapping of textile waste and fabric leftovers at Rivatex, a textile factory based in Eldoret, Kenya.
Other publication / This report demonstrates how the textile waste and leftovers from the Rivatex factory can be effectively repurposed into new, circular and marketable products.
Feature / Fashion designer Reet Aus and SEI have joined forces to create a new design-based circular business model for battling industrial textile waste.
