On Wednesday 30 March, the European Commission presented its strategy to make textile products sustainable and ‘circular’ by 2030 as part of a package of measures and announcements to enhance the circularity of goods in the EU’s single market. One of the European Commission’s main objectives is to put an end to the ‘fast fashion’ culture that prevails in the sector.
“By 2030, textiles placed on the EU market should be sustainable and recyclable, made largely from recycled fibres, free of hazardous substances and produced in a socially responsible manner”, Environment Commissioner Virginijus Sinkevičius told a group of journalists, including EUROPE, the day before.
“We want to make fast fashion out of fashion”, said the commissioner wryly, stressing the need for quality textiles that can be easily reused and repaired in the future. This paradigm shift relies heavily on companies, according to the strategy.
The European Commission wants to tackle the problem in a holistic way and wants to take into account the entire life cycle of textile products.
One of the institution’s first lines of action is in the framework of the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (see other news). The Commission thus sets a minimum content of recycled fibres in the composition of textiles. With this regulation, sustainable textile products will become the norm in the EU. It will also become prohibited to destroy unsold items under certain conditions, including unsold or returned textiles.
The European Commission wants to create a ‘Digital Product Passport for Textiles’, in line with the requirements for mandatory information on circularity and other key environmental aspects.
Revolutionising textile labelling
The Commission also intends to review the Textile Labelling Regulation, which requires textiles sold on the EU market to carry a label clearly identifying the fibre composition and indicating any non-textile parts of animal origin.
As part of this review, the Commission will introduce mandatory disclosure of other types of information, such as sustainability and circularity parameters, product size and, where relevant, the country where manufacturing processes take place.
It wants to introduce stricter controls on greenwashing, and measures against the unintentional release of microplastics in textiles. The institution will present an initiative here in the second half of 2022, the strategy says. In addition to product design, measures will target manufacturing processes, pre-washing in industrial manufacturing plants, labelling and the promotion of innovative materials, the institution says.
Extended responsibility
In addition, the measures put forward by the Commission include harmonised rules on ‘extended producer responsibility (EPR)’ for textiles with economic incentives to make products more sustainable (‘eco-modulation of fees’).
The aim is to make producers responsible for the waste created by their products in order to decouple textile waste generation from the growth of the sector. In this way, the Commission hopes to encourage manufacturers to design products that promote circularity throughout the life cycle of materials and take into account the end-of-life of products.
In this context, the Commission will put forward measures in the context of the next revision of the Waste Framework Directive in 2023. In its strategy, it will propose that a “significant” share of contributions to EPR schemes be devoted to waste prevention and re-use preparedness measures, it says.
Stopping textile waste exports
Above all, the European Commission wants to stop the export of textile waste. It announced that it has launched a study to propose binding targets for preparing textile waste for re-use and recycling in the context of the revision of EU waste legislation scheduled for 2024.
In connection with the update of the industrial strategy, the Commission wants to develop a ‘transition pathway’ for the textile sector to reach the 2030 targets set by the Textiles Strategy.
The ‘co-creation’ process, i.e. the development of the transition pathway with stakeholders and actors in the sector, will be launched in the second quarter of 2022. By the end of the year, this process should result in an agreed vision for the sector and specific commitments.
Social enterprises to the rescue
Interestingly, the European Commission refers to social enterprises to strengthen the recycling sector. On average, a social enterprise creates 20 to 35 jobs for every 1,000 tonnes of textiles collected, with a view to reuse, the European institution points out in the strategy.
Trade policy is also mentioned, particularly in the fight against counterfeiting. The European Commission intends to present a European anti-counterfeiting toolkit by 2023, to strengthen cooperation and information sharing between right holders, intermediaries, both online and offline, and law enforcement authorities such as customs, police and market surveillance authorities.
The ambition is commensurate with the stakes, as the textile sector is the fourth main source of environmental and climate pollution, after food, the construction sector and transport. However, there are no numerical targets in the strategy. Responding to EUROPE, the Commissioner said that it was still too early to set binding numerical targets.
To access the strategy: https://aeur.eu/f/11d (Original version in French by Pascal Hansens)