Amid growing concerns regarding the mismanagement of waste, an initiative has been taken up by the Basel Convention parties that are associated with the regulation of hazardous wastes’ transboundary movement and their disposal, to majorly control waste in the developing countries.
Considered as a pioneering move in the classification of waste textiles under the convention, this workplan is aimed at not only addressing the issue pertaining to inadequate facilities of waste management in developing countries but is also seen as a new step in recycling and repurposing of textiles with a goal to encourage major brands to be more proactive in meeting their circular ambitions.
With this plan of action in place, the countries and stakeholders have been asked to submit their comments by 15th November, 2025 on challenges and costs with respect to trading of textile waste and used textiles. The countries have also been encouraged to furnish their opinion on the management of textile waste transboundary movements. The Basel Convention, which is a comprehensive global treaty designed to minimise the movements of toxic and other non-hazardous wastes, has also asked the Secretariat to publish these comments on the Convention website, which will help in aiding the eventual report that is tentatively planned to be discussed in June 2026.
However, addressing the textile waste has become a matter of concern and challenge for some of the parties associated with the Basel Convention. These parties have warned that a broad classification of waste by the convention will result in beneficial hindrance in trade, potentially harming the business of those involved in recycling and repairing. Currently, the Basel Convention not only includes synthetic, natural, and floor coverings, and hazardous wastes in its ambit but also has included non-hazardous plastic wastes under its Y48 listing in Annex II, which has primarily raised concern regarding the control of such non-hazardous waste.
Regarding this discussion, a certain structure and measures have not been proposed yet but the options discussed at the COP-17 event on Basel’s Convention’s role in textile waste and used textiles, can be the options considered by the parties. These options discussed at COP-17 included not just developing partnerships to collect global data and creating technical guidelines to distinguish between used textiles and textile wastes but also weighed on the review of the Basel Convention annexes with regards to the textile waste shipments.
Further to this, the European Union (EU) has also asked its member states to adopt measures to minimise the waste generation. In Feb 2025, the EU pushed forward the mandatory EPR (Extended Producer Responsibility) in order to fuel the recycling initiatives and combat textile waste. Also, the OECD’s (Organisation For Economic Co-operation and Development) member countries had already previously furnished a report in 2024, which focussed on EPR laws for textiles.
