Buy Less, Rewear, Share – Reverse the Trend

Nearly 70% of Irish people don’t see a link between purchasing textiles and climate change and yet, the clothing industry is estimated to be responsible for 10% of carbon emissions globally.

Ireland has one of the highest rates of new textiles purchasing (including clothing) in the EU, at 53 kg per person every year. That’s more than 5 carry-on travel bags per person per year in new stuff alone!

The Reverse the Trend campaign is raising awareness amongst younger buyers of alternatives to frequent purchasing of clothing and some of the environmental impacts of overconsumption of textiles. The campaign is asking people to embrace circular fashion through the simple actions of ‘Buy Less, Re-wear, Share’.

Here’s another way we can take climate action in everyday life - By thinking about what we really need, whether we can rewear, share or repair, we can reverse the trend of buying too much.

“Circular fashion is a priority for this government in our quest to achieve a circular economy. We want to raise awareness about the impact that our buying habits have on the environment and why we need to change our current ‘take-make-waste’ approach." - Minister Ossian Smyth

• Textiles (including clothing) have the fourth highest impact on climate change, after food, housing and transport.
• Over 100 billion new items of clothes are made every year and less than 1% of material used to produce clothing is recycled into new clothing.?
• Recent research from the Environmental Protection Agency found that textiles such as clothing and household textiles make up 9% of waste in the general waste bin.? Used textiles do not belong in this bin but should be placed in a local textile collection bank or handed in to local charity shops.
• The EPA also learned that 39% of people are frequent purchasers of clothes (buying clothes on a weekly or monthly basis), of these. 14% are High Frequency Purchasers who buy clothes often on a weekly basis. 27% of people buy clothes they never end up wearing; this is much higher for High Frequency Purchasers at 46%. We urgently need to reset how we value our clothing.

Reverse the Trend is the first official sustainable fashion campaign to raise awareness among High Frequency Purchasers 16-34 years old of the impact of fast fashion and encourage the buying of fewer clothes, choosing well, wearing well through re-use, repair, swapping and sharing, and making their clothes last to protect our environment. The key messages are Buy Less, Re-Wear, Share – That’s what’s trending right now.

Textiles is a priority policy area for Government, to tackle the environmental degradation caused by this material stream and in realising our circular economy ambitions. Our current policy framework includes a Waste Action Plan for a Circular Economy 2020-2025, which sets out our policy commitments across the textile value chain. The Circular Economy (Miscellaneous Provisions) Act 2022 recognises textiles as a priority sector and provides that the next whole of government circular economy strategy will include targets for more sustainable production and consumption of textiles in Ireland.?

The Textile Advisory Group, established by DECC in 2022, brings together relevant expertise from industry, community and regulatory bodies. Gwen Cunningham of the National College of Art and Design chairs the Group, which ?will identify opportunities for Government to promote, facilitate and enable circularity in the textiles’ ecosystem. Information on the work of the Group can be found at gov.ie/CircularEconomy

?