A new hair trend sweeping the world - or at least the floors of barber shops - is seeing discarded human hair recycled to help the environment.
The initiative has rolled out across Belgium in the last few months, with the Hair Recycle project taking the cuttings and using them to create matted squares which can absorb oil and other hydrocarbons.
Apparently human hair is particularly powerful in taking on fat and hydrocarbons, with the specially created mats (pictured) deployed to soak up pollutants in water before it reaches rivers or the ocean.
The project is run by a group curiously named Dung Dung, with founder Patrick Janssen saying "our products are all the more ethical as they are manufactured locally...they are not imported from the other side of the planet.
"They are made here to deal with local problems," he said.
Hairdressers pay a small fee to have their cuttings collected, with Reuters quoting a Brussels-based salon owner saying "What motivates me, personally, is that I find it a shame hair is nowadays just thrown in the bin, when I know that so much could be done with it".
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