The Coimbatore City Municipal Corporation in Tamil Nadu, India, recently launched a textile waste collection pilot campaign called "Maru Nesavu" (meaning "reweave") in Zone 33 in the western part of the city. The campaign was inaugurated on Friday by Municipal Commissioner Katta Ravi Teja, aiming to encourage residents to hand over discarded textiles to sanitation workers for collection, in order to prevent arbitrary dumping and burning, promote recycling, and protect natural resources and the environment.

During the pilot period, waste collection will be carried out every Wednesday. The municipal department also held guidance and training sessions for sanitation workers and on-site staff. The Commissioner distributed collection bags to the sanitation workers and flagged off the collection vehicles.

This project is carried out under the "EU-India Resource Efficiency and Circular Economy Initiative" supported by the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ) India office, with Grant Thornton India as the technical partner. Vikramaditya, an assistant manager at the firm, said that the Tamil Nadu state government is conducting a one-year textile waste assessment in Chennai, Coimbatore, Tiruppur, Madurai, and Rameswaram, aiming to gain a detailed understanding of the volume and types of post-consumer textile waste and to propose solutions for recycling rather than landfilling. However, the pilot collection is currently limited to Coimbatore.

According to Vikramaditya, the sorted and collected textile waste will be processed in three categories: items in good condition can be donated to those in need or to shelters; items with minor defects will be repaired and sent to second-hand stores; and those mixed with soil, contaminated, faded, or completely damaged will be classified by fabric type and sent to the recycling cluster in Tiruppur for reuse.

The Municipal Commissioner stated that after the successful implementation of the plan in the western zone, it will be gradually extended to other areas.

Source: Coimbatore corporation launches textile waste collection pilot campaign · Originally published on 2026-08-22