With textiles rightly rising as a key priority under the new European Commission, this document outlines RREUSE’s vision on how to achieve a more inclusive and circular textile sector that prioritises re-use and emphasises the role of social enterprises in the value chain as part of the solution.

This paper also provides a number of key recommendations as to what specific actions the Commission should address when developing policy initiatives for the sector.

Textiles are fundamental to our society and employs millions of people worldwide, making it among the largest in the world and an important part of Europe's manufacturing industry. However, textile production and consumption cause significant environmental, climate and social impacts by using resources, water, land and chemicals and emitting greenhouse gases and pollutants. 

In Europe, the sector employs 1.7 million people and Europeans consume on average 26 kg of textiles per person per year. This briefing by the European Environment Agency provides an EU perspective of the environmental and climate pressures from textile production and consumption, and discusses how circular business models and regulation can help move us towards a circular textiles economy.

The Fibersort project aims at realising the widespread implementation of the automated sorting technology by validating it as a key value adding innovation to enable textile-to-textile recycling.

While the challenges and opportunities of used textiles are increasingly in the spotlight of governments, industry, and civil society, considerable system changes are required to transition towards a circular economy for textiles. Throughout this report, policy recommendations are formulated showing the legislative, economic and soft instruments that regional, national and the European governments have at their disposal to create an enabling environment for textiles collection, sorting and recycling at scale.

The EU faces multiple challenges (climate crisis, environmental disasters, a lack of competitiveness, falling behind in the digital race, etc.) that it will need to address if it is to ensure long-term sustainable prosperity for European citizens. At the same time, there are two ongoing transitions – the creation of a circular economy and the digital transformation – that could provide the means to address these challenges, if they are managed well.

As the EU and national policymakers are making significant efforts to promote a circular economy on the one hand and a digital economy on the other, Annika Hedberg and Stefan Šipka, together with Johan Bjerkem, argue that it is time to align the agendas as a means to achieve greater sustainability and competitiveness.

This publication:

• demonstrates what digitalisation means in the context of a circular economy;
• considers what a greater focus on sustainability would mean for the digital transition;
• examines the role of the EU policy framework, tools and initiatives in steering a (digital) transition towards a (digital) circular economy and makes recommendations for EU institutions for the next five year.

It suggests that the EU must:

• think systemically, define a vision and act;
• provide an adequate governance framework and economic incentives for a (digital) transition to a (digital) circular economy;
• encourage collaboration across European society and economy as well as globally, and empower its citizens to contribute to the transition.

This Discussion Paper builds on the findings of the EPC’s "Digital Roadmap for a Circular Economy" project of 2017-19 and paves the way for a more extensive final study, scheduled to be published in the late autumn of 2019.

The project has been supported by Aalto University and the Natural Resources Institute Finland (Luke) (members of Helsinki EU Office), Central Denmark region, Climate-KIC, the Estonian Ministry of the Environment, Estonian Environment Investment Centre, HP, Orgalim, the province of Limburg, UL, Fondazione Cariplo and Cariplo Factory.