The Sustainable Products Initiative, or SPI, will be a key part of the continent’s climate-neutral goals. The initiative is focused on redesigning how products are made and stopping the destruction of unsold goods, while also reducing energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions. That includes exploring ways to limit microfiber production and implementing digital passports for all products. It also addresses greenwashing, which has become a big issue in Europe and the U.K., by encouraging brands to adopt E.U.-recognized labels, among other measures. The E.U. Ecolabel has been used to signify products meeting specific ecological standards since 1992.

The U.K.’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is in the process of investigating fashion brands that have been accused of greenwashing within their marketing in the last year. In a recent study, the Changing Markets Foundation found that almost 60% of green claims made by 12 major brands across industries in the U.K. and Europe were unsubstantiated or misleading.

The SPI legislation has implications for the international market, too.

According to Kristen Fanarakis, who founded slow L.A.-based fashion brand Senza Tempo in 2017, the legislation will affect international brands that sell products in the U.K. and E.U. “If California implemented a sustainable standard, brands selling into California would have to [meet the new standard] across the board,” Fanarakis said, offering an example.

With ultra-fast-fashion brand Shein raising funding for a $100 billion valuation in its reported pre-IPO round, the move cannot come sooner. Worldwide, fast fashion is distributing low-quality, trend-driven garments with obsolescence built-in.

Philippa Grogan, sustainability consultant at sustainable business strategy company Eco Age, said the new legislation doesn’t go far enough. She said that the E.U. should quantify the legislation more and have steps in place allowing brands to strategically address the overproduction of clothing. “Brands are producing too many clothes for any of the recycling systems to deal with,” she said. “It makes consumers think that clothing can be viewed as disposable, like a Kleenex. That really fits into the Shein model.” According to the European Environment Agency, in Europe, clothing use has the fourth-highest impact on the environment and climate, beaten only by food, housing and transport.

But the legislation could also affect parts of the supply chain under strain, as fashion brands are battling soaring energy prices in the bloc and challenges driven by the war in Ukraine. The proposal could limit the dependency on Russian energy imports by relying on products that are already in production and limiting additional processing.

The …read more

Source:: Digiday

Author: Aaron