Author: PBSAmerica
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PBS America | Sky 534 | Virgin Media 243 | pbsamerica.co.uk Did you ever wonder what happens to the clothes you give away after you have finished with them? You probably thought that they ended up in the hands of the needy - but how did they get there? Shantha Bloemen's film investigates the secondhand clothes business and its effect on an increasingly globalised economy. The journey begins on the streets of a western city, where clothes are dropped off in charity bins, moves to a distributor who ships the clothes by the ton, and continues to Zambia where an importer then sells them to individuals, who form another link in the distribution chain. The film meets 19-year-old Luka, who supports his family by selling the clothes in a remote part of western Zambia. Secondhand clothes provide a livelihood for many like Luka, but for the Zambian clothing and textile industries, the cost has been enormous. Since the country's markets were opened to free trade in 1991, a condition demanded by the country's international creditors in return for debt relief, the domestic clothes manufacturing industry has been effectively wiped out. Having followed the t-shirts on their travels, the documentary raises more questions than it answers. Meanwhile, the twin problems of debt and poverty in sub-Saharan Africa remain as acute as they were when this film was made.