How Millions Of Jeans Rep Recycled Into Unique Pairs | World Extensive Extinguish | Insider Exchange

We make over 1 billion pairs of jeans every year and most of them wind up in landfills that's partially because cotton is notoriously hard to recycle the process is lengthy and expensive but some in the fashion industry want to make a Greener pair of blue jeans artistic fabric mills AFM for short is.

One of the first companies in Pakistan to repurpose old Cotton into new Denim and that's a big deal because this country Imports more used clothes than anywhere else in the world so how do you recycle jeans it starts at massive facilities like this one in Karachi where workers sort 25 metric tons of used clothes every day.

Most of these items were donated to Charities like the Salvation Army in other countries oftentimes whatever can't be sold in American and European thrift stores can be sold to grading centers in Pakistan purses sweaters pants and more gets separated into hundreds of categories items are bundled based on quality and.

Type then they're shipped to places like this huge second-hand Market in Ghana here local vendors bid on bales then try to sell their Wares for a profit back in Pakistan the lowest grade garments are sold for cheap to recyclers typically to be shredded and used in.

Things like insulation and where most sea rags AFM sees riches it buys used jeans from this local Grading Company clothes which are like too dirty or not good for wearing we give it to like the companies like artistic for recycling at AFM workers cut down the garments.

The company can't process stretch jeans mixed with polyester or nylon so it only accepts denim that is at least 98 cotton it takes around three pairs of used jeans to make one pair of recycled pants a quick pass through this conveyor belt Cuts these long strips of fabric into small pieces each step aims to grind the pants back.

Into cotton this compactor presses the cotton into large bales the company says these machines can process up to 800 metric tons of used clothes every month but the Recycled fibers are too short to be spun into yarn so the company has to add virgin cotton into the mix.

When AFM first bought a cotton recycling plant in 2015 It could only incorporate five percent recycled material into its blend nowadays it can mix in as much as 30 percent used cotton this machine called a blender mat skims off the top layer of fiber from multiple Bales to ensure consistency this particular batch of denim will use.

Eight percent recycled material and 92 virgin cotton in the spinning room a carting machine draws the Blended cotton into a web then stretches it into thick ropes called slivers the ring spinning process turns rope into yarn though largely automated now this method.

Is based on Ancient yarn spinning techniques the fiber is Twisted tightly and then wrapped around a spool called a bobbin workers Place larger spools on a metal rack called a Creel then they wind the threads around a beam one of these can hold over 4 000 strands.

Of yarn side by side now it's time for a bath AFM dyes its fabric with recycled Indigo eliminating Wastewater from the dyeing process entirely making this fabric by extracting to the strips appear green at first because.

Indigo dye is not water soluble the threads will only turn blue when they come into contact with oxygen that's why the ropes are brought high up into the air the process is called skying these rollers press out the excess water then each rope lands in its own bucket in the Rope dyeing Department production.

Is around 70 000 meters per day typically the Indigo dyeing process is associated with massive water consumption and pollution although laws prohibit it some Pakistani factories pump untreated water into sewers City canals rivers and groundwater contaminating already scarce supplies.

Many factories lack the space or resources to treat their water but AFM says it purifies around 300 000 gallons of Wastewater in a giant treatment plant every day up to 70 percent of this water is used in its recycling process back at the factory an automated Loom mixes dyed thread with white thread.

Typically in a ratio of three to one this gives jeans their signature twill pattern the fabric wraps around giant wheels then gets layered into sheets in total AFM produces 36 million meters of fabric a year that's nearly enough to circle the entire planet the finished cloth gets cut into various.

Sizes and styles using Cutting Edge software lasers etch patterns into the jeans this technology eliminates the need for toxic chemicals often used to create a stressed vintage look AFM uses less water in its finishing process as a result saving water is crucial in Pakistan.

Much of the country relies on the Indus River for irrigation and hydropower but Extreme droughts mean parts of it are already drying up it takes 10 000 liters of water to make a single pair of jeans so cutting back on water consumption can have a huge impact eco-friendly washers give the genes a more distressed look.

The sustainable watch means less energy less water less chemical this is the big impact for the sustainability Factor what we are doing right now then a blower dries the jeans while they hang in the air think of it like a car wash for pants workers add the finishing touches from buttons to labels.

From there they're off to stores across Europe North America and Australia once used jeans get a second shelf life while it may look like AFM has its process down to a science it wasn't always that way the now multi-million dollar company started as a small garment shop in 1949. Ahmed Omer and his wife hadra Ahmed sold.

Handmade leather hats and bags to Sailors out of their home in 1972 they opened their first garment Factory today it's run by their son Iqbal Ahmed hydra's role in the company would later Inspire her granddaughters pharah and Haya Iqbal to follow in her footsteps the two sisters are now directors for AFM.

My grandmother would actually manage the operations at that time and who into factories when women apply to AFM for jobs not just on a worker level but for management roles they do it because they know that it's a possibility here AFM has also been ahead of the curve when it comes to manufacturing.

Sustainable denim in 2015 it became one of the first companies in Pakistan to own this a cotton recycling plant from there producing recycled denim became priority number one AFM isn't alone in its mission to recycle textiles other factories in Pakistan are investing in Cotton.

Recycling as well even big name companies like h m have invested millions in New Recycling technology at The Company Store in Stockholm customers pay to have old clothes transformed into new ones but recycling a single garment can take multiple days h m wants to move to a hundred percent.

Recycled or sustainably sourced materials by 2030 but scaling up recycled production is expensive AFM has a decades-long head start the cost of its factories though massive were spread out over many years at the time nobody was doing it no customers even understood why it was a necessity but it was my father's Vision that he.

Stuck his ground and he made this massive investment because he could tell where the world was heading AFM says it has the capacity to create half a million pairs of jeans every month but its actual production is around three hundred thousand for recycled genes to become a large-scale success more companies need.

To get involved right now less than one percent of all clothes are turned into recycled garments an even simpler solution is to buy less I firmly believe that consuming less but of better quality is the way forward and that's because this is not to discourage people from.

Buying more but if they buy better and they buy better quality once somebody is done with the garments that can always be resold second hand or donated it just increases the life of a garment if you buy better quality

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