Traders in Ghana face uncertain future after world’s largest secondhand clothing hub razed in fire

Trader Akua Afumwaa sat quietly, her hand on her chin, at the spot where her stall in Kantamanto Market once stood in Accra, Ghana, looking completely devastated.

After a massive fire broke out here on Jan. 1, a vast stretch of once-vibrant shops was reduced to rubble. The ground is littered with charred fabrics, piles of ash and shattered floor tiles.

“I’ve worked so hard for this business, and now it feels like all my investment is gone,” Afumwaa said. “I don’t even know where to start.”

Like the thousands of other traders in the area, Afumwaa’s future is uncertain. She has no insurance, and she fears that she may never be able to recover from the losses.

The incident has claimed one life and left hundreds of people in need of urgent medical attention.

Another trader, 65-year-old Maame Nyarkoa Abronoma, has spent over a decade selling secondhand bags and clothing.

She hopelessly sifted through the debris, struggling to make sense of the tragedy. She ​​has lost 60 bales of merchandise and thousands of dollars in cash.

“We’ve had fire outbreaks in previous years, but this is beyond anything we’ve ever experienced,” Abronomaha said. “Being a widow for the past 25 years, the secondhand clothing business has been my family’s only means of survival. The pain is just unbearable — my heart aches.”

Kantamanto Market, the world’s largest secondhand clothing hub, is home to more than 30,000 traders and employs many others, including launderers, tailors, porters and drivers.

It also helps shape local fashion trends by providing affordable clothing for millions of Ghanaians.

More than 15 million pieces of secondhand clothing from major fashion brands in the US, UK, China, and Canada flood the market each week.

In 2021, Ghana became the world’s largest importer of used garments, valued at over $200 million.

“Now I can’t even sleep,” Abronoma added. “My blood pressure is out of control. I imported these items less than a week ago on credit, hoping to make a profit in the new year. How do I pay back my loan now? We desperately need help from the government.”

But so far, there has been no official government response, and investigators are still trying to ascertain what caused the fire and the full scale and cost of the destruction.

Nearby, on a vast stretch of land — roughly the size of a football pitch — traders, armed with shovels and pickaxes, dug through the debris to make way for rebuilding efforts. Some hammered together wooden frames, while others installed long wooden planks into the ground. They’ve been rebuilding quickly to secure their spots.

Among them was 55-year-old Charles Oduro, who started his secondhand business over three decades ago. He sells women’s clothing and lost 46 stock bales in the fire.

“For 30 years, I’ve poured my heart into this business, and now, in an instant, it’s all gone. I don’t even know how I’ll manage to feed my family now,” he said.

He also has no insurance and nothing to fall back on.

“I don’t think insurance is for people like me — I see it as something for the rich. Besides, I don’t trust insurance companies, so I never bothered to get insured,” he explained.

Others, like Papa Antwi, who deals in secondhand shoes and lost everything to the inferno, even tried to get insurance, but to no avail.

“I’ve brought insurance companies here several times, but they refuse to insure me because my business is in a wooden structure. They said they only cover brick-and-mortar buildings,” he said.

Wooden stalls, however, make up most of Kantamanto Market, and the used clothing sold is also highly flammable. With narrow pathways, no fire hydrants and food vendors using various fuels, the market is a huge fire risk, said Larry Kwesi Jiagge, an insurance consultant with Ghana’s National Insurance Commission.

“Insurance is about accidental events, not things you are sure will happen. The sorts of structures we have at Kantamanto will always lead periodically to fire. So, If we don’t fix the structural issues and address the hazards in Kantamanto, it will always be hard for insurers to provide coverage,” he said.

Jiagge explained that the low insurance coverage in Kantamanto is compounded by financial institutions’ failure to follow regulations, which require formal or informal businesses to have insurance to qualify for loans.

He said that the disaster actually offers the government an opportunity to rebuild Kantamanto Market into a safer, more resilient and insurance-compliant marketplace.

“We can’t keep rebuilding after each fire,” Jiagge said. “Let’s prioritize safety and ensure our markets are secure for the people who rely on them.”

In a country where 70% of the population lacks any form of insurance, the Ghana Traders Advocacy Group says that, in addition to reconstructing the market, insurance companies must take a more active role in getting appropriate information to people.

“I think there are way too many misconceptions out there about insurance,” said Nana Opoku, the group’s general secretary. So, his group is appealing to insurance companies to invest in educating people on the importance of insurance.

He added that Ghana’s extensive mobile payment systems could significantly improve insurance access, making it easier for millions to pay premiums and receive claims through mobile phones. 

Opoku said they are also working with some insurance companies to develop affordable and tailored insurance policies to meet the specific needs of traders in Kantamanto.

“Instead of the actual premium an outsider would pay, we’ve actually agreed with them to bring the premium down to the level of even a table-top seller, so that they will all be covered when situations like this happen. Ghana needs to create more inclusive policies to ensure informal traders are protected,” he said.

Meanwhile, the Or Foundation, a sustainable fashion NGO in Ghana, has launched a $1 million fund to support the market’s rebuilding efforts. Daniel Mawuli Quist, who works with the foundation, said Kantamanto plays a huge role in reducing environmental waste globally.

“As it stands, Kantamanto is part of a circular economy — the model of redistributing the garments, the textile wastes, [counters] the overproduction issues that we have globally so that they don’t go back into the environment,” he said. “So, we also see this fund as not just for rebuilding the market but for sustaining Kantamanto’s crucial environmental sustainability role.

Advocates argue that fast fashion brands must take responsibility for their role in the mounting waste crisis and are urging major names frequently found at the Kantamanto market — including Nike, Adidas, Gildan, Marks & Spencer and H&M — to help the affected traders rebuild their livelihoods.

Meanwhile, the traders from the Kantamanto Market are focusing on their immediate survival — finding ways to resume business and provide for their families. But it is unclear how quickly that will happen.