H&M’s spring Conscious Collection featured a blush evening gown made from plastics collected from the shore of Jakarta, Indonesia. Adidas put out a swimwear line made from discarded fishing nets collected from the ocean – one of these giant nets can apparently yield 1,000 swimsuits – and is now using recycled ocean plastic to update its classic shoe designs. In luxury designer Stella McCartney’s latest ad campaign, models dance and pose in front of mounds of landfill garbage to celebrate using polyester from recycled plastic ocean waste.

“Ocean plastic” as defined by fashion companies is a loose term. It’s not possible right now to collect plastic directly from the ocean, because most of it has broken down into far too tiny bits to be efficiently collected. So brands instead are turning to a process that looks more and more like old-fashion recyclables collection – albeit by private textile companies rather than municipal authorities.

Parley, who provides the material for the Parley Ultraboost collection by Adidas, gets its plastic mainly from beach cleanups around the world. But in the Maldives, Parley is working on education and setting up a waste diversion system that goes beyond just cleanup. In Indonesia, where locals tend to bury plastic waste on the beach, Parley is working on raising awareness and providing materials for waste collection. The textile manufacturer Aquafil has relationships with families in the Philippines and Cameroon who collect and sell discarded fishing nets used in ECONYL fabric. Nike is even designing new products based on what is most easily collectable.

In the United States, a few states have adopted deposit-return systems, in which consumers pay extra for bottles, which can be returned to recycling facilities for a refund. This has pushed recycling rates in those states up to 70 to 95%. But in developing countries that struggle to build and maintain basic infrastructure like recycling pick-up, recycled plastic fashion may help them leapfrog right over recycling collections infrastructure, much like private cell phone technology leapfrogged over telephone infrastructure.

By monetizing plastic waste, fashion companies can incentivize the citizens in Indonesia, China, the Philippines, and beyond to collect plastic bottles and fishing nets instead of tossing them by the side of the road or in the ocean, and provide additional income for the world’s poorest coastal residents. The next obvious step is for textile manufacturers to invest in basic plastic waste collection centers, and locate them near to textile manufactures.

As social entrepreneurs and innovative companies experiment with solutions on the ground, the Paris Climate accord is making a carbon tax or cap-and-trade look ever more likely. This would push up the cost of polyester made from virgin petroleum and make recycled polyester look more enticing from a profit perspective.

With fashion conglomerates buying up leather farms and tanneries in order to secure their supply, you may before long see Adidas or C&A-branded recycling containers on your next visit to Bali.

Alden Wicker writes on behalf of the Fabric of Change Initiative, a partnership between Ashoka and C&A Foundation to support social entrepreneurs and bring transformational change to the apparel industry: www.changemakers.com/fabricofchange