Weaving circularity into the textile industry

Abstract

India is burdened by a variety of waste streams originating from both domestic and non-domestic sources, as a result of both production and consumption activities. The current infrastructure presents a challenge in handling these waste streams, resulting in a substantial volume of waste being mismanaged, losing value, and more concerningly, harming local communities and the environment.

This project employed systemic design to explore a circular approach to this issue, namely to create value from textile waste, and how these activities may be enabled through a communication means. Cotton-based textile waste generated by first-tier garment manufacturers in India was placed as a system of interest. Through primary and secondary research, further understanding of the system was gathered. Three methods of analysis yielded insights on the stakeholders, (value creation) activities, material flow, as well as barriers and drivers of value creation. Ideas collected from creative brainstorming sessions, combined with research insights, produced potential leverage points for interventions in the system, that led to the formulation of a design direction and a future vision.

An intervention in the form of an online knowledge base was conceptualised with the intent of closing knowledge gaps on circularity and the textile value chain, in order to propel informed circular actions from a system lens. It is targeted toward (potential) value creators with an existing motivation to create solutions for textile waste. The way of communicating information was built upon learnings from card sorting activities and the Three Horizons framework. Evaluation with the potential audience showed that the concept offered a valuable knowledge foundation in developing textile waste solutions. Additionally, it highlighted that more interventions would indeed be necessary to translate motivation into action. Learnings from the evaluation sessions were then incorporated into the concept iteration as well as future recommendations.

This project was organised with Enviu as client partner, as part of the Putting Waste to Work project in partnership with Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), Concordia Textiles, and Purfi Global.