Used clothing trade is progressing in Switzerland. On the Ricardo platform alone, he jumped more than 30% in two years. To fight against the “fast fashion” also increasing, Public Eye offers the creation of a fashion for fashion.
More than 600,000 used clothing and accessories were sold on the Ricardo online platform in 2024, an increase of 31% in two years, according to a press release from Ricardo published on Tuesday. The average selling price of a used woman’s clothing was around 27 francs, men’s clothes were on average around 41 francs.
But the second -hand trade is not the only one to have the odds. The consumption of “fast fashion” – or disposable mode – also increases in Europe as in Switzerland. According to a study by the European Environment Agency (AEE), the consumption of textiles per capita in Europe reached 19 kilos in 2022, two kilos more than in 2019.
A large part of the textiles consumed end up in the trash. According to the European study, only 22% of used textiles are collected or reused.
Swiss Fund for fashion
In Switzerland, each year, one person consumes on average more than 14 kilos of clothing and shoes, said Public Eye in a separate press release. In the end, 100,000 tonnes of clothes per year – products at low prices and barely worn – end up incinerated as waste or exported to lower -income countries.
The funds raised would be used to support repair services, to strengthen second -hand supply, to improve the sorting and recycling of textiles, as well as to finance other awareness initiatives
The organization announces to launch a petition asking the Federal Council to create a Swiss fashion fund. The goal: to oblige companies in the sector to participate in the social and environmental costs of their business model.
-“The principle is relatively simple: all fashion brands-whether retailers, manufacturers or importers-would be required to pay a contribution to a fund for each new article on the Swiss market. The more sustainable the product, the lower this contribution,” explains Géraldine Viret, public spokesperson Eye, Tuesday at the microphone of forum. “The objective is to encourage the production of more sustainable clothing and slow down overconsumption.”
Before adding: “The funds raised would be used to support repair services, to strengthen second -hand supply, to improve the sorting and recycling of textiles, as well as to finance other awareness initiatives.”
Public Eye cites the example of the EU and France, which take legislative measures against disposable fashion. The Federal Council also recognized the problem and mentioned the possibility of a tax on sorting and recycling, but does not take a position, impatient the organization.
Problem complexity
The fashion industry would be responsible for 4 billion tonnes of CO2 per year. For Fanny Parise, anthropologist, researcher at the University of Lausanne and the author of “Gâté children, anthropology of the myth of responsible capitalism”, it is time to tighten the screw. “From an anthropological point of view, it was time to tighten the screw, but it is not simple. Otherwise other measures would have already been born before,” she notes in Forum.
The example of the carbon market in other sectors shows that we often witness bypass strategies, rather than a deep questioning of our needs, the role of industry, and more particularly that of fashion
The real question, according to her, is to know who will really assume the consequences – or the “broken pots” – linked to these new taxes. “The example of the carbon market in other sectors shows that we often witness bypass strategies, rather than a deep questioning of our needs, the role of industry, and more particularly that of fashion.”
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