Some 110,000 tonnes of second-hand clothes are collected in Italy each year in a business worth approximately 200 million euros, non-profit organisations operating in the sector said on Tuesday.
However, the used garments donated by Italians and left at designated collection points increasingly end up fuelling an illegal trade, according to a study by the Italian chapter of Humana People to People and research centre Occhio del Riciclone. "We believe political action is needed to increase the level of transparency across the entire chain," said Occhio del Riciclone president Raniero Maggini. "The more the chain is controlled by bodies that are not pursuing profit, the greater the amount of used clothes effectively destined for charity programmes," added Humana People to People Italia president Karina Bolin, referring to municipalities responsible for organising the collection in particular.
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