Insights
- Europeans are buying and discarding more clothing, footwear and other textiles than ever before, which is putting more pressure on climate and environment, an EEA briefing says.
- Out of 12 European household consumption categories, textile consumption ranked the fifth largest in terms of environmental and climate pressures on an average.
- A systemic shift in the textiles system is needed, it notes.
Europeans are buying and discarding more clothing, footwear and other textiles than ever before, which is putting more pressure on climate and environment, according to a recent European Environment Agency (EEA) briefing.
The updated consumption data highlights the need for policymakers, industry and consumers to play their role in helping Europe shift away from the fast-fashion trend, to produce better, longer lasting quality textiles that are designed to last long, and can be reused, repaired and recycled.
The average European Union (EU) citizen bought 19 kg of clothing, footwear and household textiles in 2022—up from 17 kg in 2019, which is enough to fill a large suitcase per person each year, the briefing, titled, ‘Circularity of the EU textiles value chain in numbers’, noted.
The impact of the EU’s current production and consumption of textiles system continues to cause high pressures on environment and climate, including through material use, water and land use, greenhouse gas emissions, chemical and microplastics.
While the EU textiles strategy is aimed at reducing these impacts and making textiles more circular and sustainable by design, for its success, a systemic shift in the textiles system is needed, moving to the production of more circular goods and higher quality goods that have longer use value, and can be more easily reused, repaired or recycled, the briefing observed.
The combination of increased online shopping, social media influencers and cheap production costs for synthetic textiles has been instrumental in the growth of fast fashion.
This has allowed retailers to offer consumers new styles at low prices. The EEA briefing notes that digital technologies like 3D printing can reduce waste in production and can be used to reduce the environmental and climate pressures from textiles by improving efficiency.
However, they also risk increasing consumption by enabling cheaper production costs and lower prices.
The environmental and climate pressures from EU textiles production and consumption remain high. Out of 12 categories of European household consumption—such as food, mobility, housing, health and education—textile consumption ranked, on an average, the fifth largest in terms of environmental and climate pressures.
The EEA measured these impacts across the metrics of raw material use, greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and water and land use.
The average collection of textile waste in the EU has been slowly increasing, rising by 4.3 percentage points since 2016, but overall, the collection of this waste has been low.
The implementation of EU legislation on separate textile waste collection, starting in 2025, is expected to significantly increase the capture rates for textiles from households, the briefing notes.
While exports of used textiles from the EU are intended for reuse or recycling, studies show that EU textile exports enter a very complex pattern of trade, sorting, reuse, recycling and landfilling, and some is being burned or dumped in nature across mainly African and Asian countries, it added.
Source: https://www.fibre2fashion.com/