Containers for used clothing. (source: Ekocharita Slovensko)
From January, old, worn clothing should be thrown into a black municipal waste bin, into textile waste. As of next year, the collection of such waste will be ensured by local governments.
How they decide to go about it - whether they will have a special container or organise a collection - is entirely up to them.
Look for information online or in newspapers
Citizens of each municipality and town should look for information in their local newspaper, radio, or municipality website.
However, it is not clear what counts as textile waste as Slovak legislation does not yet state what is considered textile. More precise rules should be set by an EU directive. Once adopted, the Slovak Environment Ministry will make appropriate changes, including the so-called producer responsibility, meaning that producers should contribute to waste collection. This should happen in the course of 2025.
Until that happens, municipalities should consider the most affordable option finance-wise.
Those that have not provided a way to collect textile before are now looking for a partner and the optimal collection method. For those that have, the service has mostly been free of charge. That will change as companies that provided the service can no longer do so for free, which is why some are introducing fees. The costs should range from €100 to €250 per tonne.
Municipalities hope that any costs accompanying the obligation will soon be borne by clothing manufacturers.
No changes in capital
In Bratislava, there are several options to choose from. If you think clothing or textile is no longer suitable for wearing, you can bring it to a collection yard (zberný dvor). Otherwise, if it is still wearable and you have no one to give it to, you can throw it into special containers. These are 400 of them throughout the city, operated by three companies: TextilEco, Humana, and Ekocharita, with the last having more than 1,300 containers throughout Slovakia. Ekocharita is also introducing bins solely for textile waste.
It is an open question how much textile waste Slovaks produce in a year, with some studies suggesting that it is 65,000 tonnes every year - of which 55,000 tonnes are waste and only 10,000 tonnes can be reused - while other studies estimate as much as 100,000 tonnes.
