1. Incentivize and Support Design for Longevity and Recyclability
3. Encourage the market to use less clothing, and for longer
2. Produce Virgin Natural Fibers Sustainably, Including Land Use
Global
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation, an international charity, committed to the creation of a circular economy that tackles some of the biggest challenges of our time, such as climate change and biodiversity loss. Driven by design, a circular economy eliminates waste and pollution, keeps products and materials in use, and regenerates natural systems, creating benefits for society, the environment, and the economy.
Launched in May 2017 by the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, Make Fashion Circular brings together leaders from across the fashion industry to work with cities, philanthropists, NGOs, and innovators. Make Fashion Circular is leading international efforts to stop waste and pollution in fashion by creating a circular economy for the industry, where products (apparel, footwear and accessories) are used more, are made to be made again and are made from safe and recycled or renewable inputs.
The Ellen MacArthur Foundation report, A new textiles economy: Redesigning fashion’s future, identifies the fashion industry’s current take-make-dispose model as the root cause of its environmental problems and economic value loss, including:
Make Fashion Circular brings together leaders from across the fashion industry, including brands, municipalities, NGOs, and innovators behind a shared vision to radically redesign the fashion industry. Projects to date include #WearNext and The Jeans Redesign
In July 2019, the Foundation’s Make Fashion Circular initiative launched The Jeans Redesign, a project which saw 80 industry experts input on a set of guidelines to create denim jeans aligned with the principles of the circular economy. Two years on from launch, participating brands of The Jeans Redesign have put more than half a million pairs of jeans fit for a circular economy on the market, meeting minimum requirements for durability, traceability, and recyclability, while using safe materials and processes. The Jeans Redesign: Insights from the first two years revealed the barriers, solutions and innovation gaps faced by the 72 brands, retailers, garment manufacturers, fabric mills and laundries. In July 2021, 28 new participants joined the project bringing the total number of participants taking action to redesign jeans to 94.
Make Fashion Circular brings together industry leaders including Strategic Partner H&M Group and Partners, Inditex, Lacoste, Primark, PVH Corp, and Ralph Lauren Corporation to drive momentum towards the Make Fashion Circular vision and scale solutions globally.
Find out more about Make Fashion Circular here.
1. Incentivize and Support Design for Longevity and Recyclability
3. Encourage the Market to Use Less Clothing, and for Longer
4. Guide and Support New Business Models for Environmental, Financial, and Social Triple-Win
To create positive impact, we have to turn global ambitions for circular clothing into tangible action points that can be taken up by local actors”
- David Rogers, Head of International Resource Management at WRAP
Global and National (UK, Textiles 2030)
WRAP, a charity working with governments, businesses, and communities to deliver practical solutions to improve resource efficiency.
WRAP aims to develop global goals for a circular clothing economy and facilitate their translation into national frameworks with measurable targets.
They focus on three long-term ambitions set out in the Ellen MacArthur Foundation's vision of a circular economy for fashion:
1) Circular Design – Clothes are made to be made again
2) Circular Manufacture – Clothes are made from safe and renewable or recycled inputs
3) Circular Retail – Clothes are used more
There is an urgent need to address the catastrophic environmental impacts of Fast Fashion. The current clothing system is extremely inefficient. It is estimated that more than half of fast fashion produced is disposed of in under a year[1].
To shift to a sustainable textile industry will require a radical re-imagining of the current linear models. Many initiatives are already trying to combat this and drive a move to a circular economy – however, they all fall short.
Currently, there is no proven, coordinated way of delivering change that harnesses government involvement and industry leadership, connects existing initiatives, and holds them to account.
WRAP has an extensive track record of delivering change through the use of Voluntary Agreements. These have proven effective across multiple industry sectors and in multiple countries around the world and offer an alternative policy option to cumbersome, expensive, and inflexible legislation. WRAP has used its experience in developing these agreements to produce a ‘Blueprint’ to facilitate the successful delivery of national agreements across food and plastics.
Project partner WRI has complimentary experience in both metric setting and policy engagement which underpin the successful implementation of such agreements. With funding from the Laudes Foundation (formerly C&A Foundation), WRAP will work closely with other key players in the circular fashion space to establish an effective, replicable model for national circular clothing action Plans.
In April 2021, WRAP introduced the UK's Sustainable Textiles Action Plan: Textiles 2030™. This ambitious new initiative is on a mission to transform the fashion and textiles sector into a climate-neutral and profitable industry that is fit for the future. With over 35 organisations signed up, Textiles 2030™ is bringing the whole fashion and textiles industry together with governments, research institutes, innovators and disruptors with a bold commitment to make fashion more sustainable and tackle climate change.
The following steps are planned:
Map out existing circular clothing initiatives and define gaps
Develop global targets
Find an in-country partner and win the support of the national government
Build a steering committee with important local players from across the fashion supply chain
Define national framework in cooperation with local stakeholders
Develop governance structure and allocate funding
Agree on most impactful interventions and roadmap
Establish metrics, data collection method, and reporting standard
Run pilot in-country
Produce a Blueprint on how to set up a Voluntary Agreement on Circular Fashion
Evaluate project results and disseminate achievements and lessons learned
Successful completion of the project will be expanded on two dimensions:
Share learning with the parallel agreement in the UK
Replicate the project in other countries
[1] Ellen Macarthur Foundation, A new Textiles Economy (2017) https://www.ellenmacarthurfoundation.org/assets/downloads/publications/A-New-Textiles-Economy_Full-Report_Updated_1-12-17.pdf
WRAP, the World Resources Institute
textilesactionnetwork@wrap.org.uk
danishcircularpact@wrap.org.uk
