OUR TOXIC CAST-OFFS

Tons of clothes donated in UK are festering intextile heap in Ghana

- NADA FARHOUD

DISCARDED clothing that was once worn in the UK rots in a 30ft-high toxic textile mountain in Ghana's capital Accra.

It is an environmental crisis caused by our obsession with fast fashion.

Nearby, at a beach in the Jamestown district, kids play on a rotting carpet of old clothing wedged in the sand.

I found dozens of British labels including items from John Lewis, Marks & Spencer and New Look.

These garments were donated to charity shops or put in clothing recycling banks by well-meaning Brits expecting them to be reused.

But campaigners say much of the clothing being donated in the UK is cheap and mass produced, leaving Ghana - the main recipient of our second-hand garments at breaking point.

Liz Ricketts, co-founder of The Or Foundation, a non-profit organisation probing the impact of the second-hand clothing trade in Accra, said: "It's an environmental catastrophe.

Fast fashion is the mass production of cheap garments to cater to changing trends. Items are often worn just once.

Chinese fashion retail website Shein sells tops for just £1.05. But the desire for cheap, disposable clothes comes at a cost. I found the full scale in west Africa where Ghana's capital is drowning in used clothes.

With no facilities to deal with it and the official landfill site overflowing, much is burnt or left in the gutter.

It makes its way to the sea via drains or is dumped at the textile mountain at Old Fadama, where 40,000 of Accra's most vulnerable citizens live.

Cattle forage on the heap, which also contains other landfill, while waste pickers search for scraps. It is a breeding ground for malaria-carrying mosquitoes.

The river, also overflowing with waste, brings with it the risk of cholera. Two miles away, Kantamanto Market is full of clothes.