Efficiency of Plastic Waste Management in the Apparel Industry

Abstract

Managing of waste can be a very challenging task in the apparel sectors since they have to deal with a wide variety and large volumes of different kinds of waste. Hence a well-structured and a comprehensive plan of action for the management of these waste is required because this has become an important and an integral part of the society. Heavy attention should be given on the efficient and sustainable management of plastic waste in the apparel industry due to the increased cost and the decreasing availability for landfill space for sanitary landfills and care should be taken to implement such a process with the minimum possible environmental impacts. This analysis explained and identified how the factors affecting the efficiency of the processes helps to improve the efficiency of the process and also to investigate the current situation and various ways of handling plastic waste along with analysing whether further generation of waste is minimized as output. A significant positive relationship between the independent variables product design and reworks with the plastic waste management was identified based on the Pearson correlation coefficient while a positive relationship which was insignificant was obtained between the independent variables lead time and reworks respectively with the dependent variable plastic waste management. This paper also contributes with proposals for future research such as the need of a more qualitative approach to yield better results and the need to expand the currently selected base for the research with a greater number of statistical analytical tools along with the proposal of novel and developed methods of sustainable plastic waste management in the apparel industry.