Eurofins Softlines & Leather Monthly Bulletin (November 2021)

EUROPE

New circular economy action plan

On 17 November 2021, The European Commission published the new circular economy action plan.

This Resolution emphasises the need to have a circular economy and underlines that sustainable, circular, safe and non-toxic products and materials should become the norm in the EU market.

Included in the sustainable product policy framework and key product value chains are textile products. The main points for textiles are:

• The importance of a new EU textile strategy to promote sustainability and circularity.
• Improvement of the design of textiles (increase durability, reusability, mechanical recyclability and the use of high-quality fibres).
• A combination of eco-design type requirements, producer responsibility schemes, and labelling schemes.
• Measures against synthetic microfibre loss, and standards for equipping new washing machines with microfiber filters.
• Other measures such as the development of preventive controlled non-polluting industrial pre-washing.
• Specific EU wide disposal criteria for textiles.
• Tackling hazardous and harmful chemicals in line with the waste hierarchy.

For more information, consult the official publication on the European Commission website here.

Standards updates

The following table summarises the most recent standard updates and upcoming dates of withdrawal (non-exhaustive):

(*) Date of withdrawal: latest date by which national standards conflicting with an EN (and HD for CENELEC) have to be withdrawn.

U.S.

Standards updates

The table below summarises some recent ASTM standards updates:

CHINA

Focus on the upcoming Chinese footwear GB standards

With the increasing demands of the Chinese people's standard of living and consumer health and safety protection consciousness, as well as the rapid development of the shoe industry in China, the style, design and material of shoes have been updated rapidly. Government, social media, and consumers are paying more and more attention to footwear product safety issues, including chemical and physical properties.

On 4 April 2019, the National Standardisation Management Committee published a notice regarding the plans for the Establishment and Revision of 44 Compulsory National Standards.

These plans included the drafts and revisions of two mandatory footwear standards. ​In May 2021, the two drafts were completed. One of them is titled Safety Technical Specifications for Infants’ and Children’s Footwear, and the other one is General Safety Requirements for Footwear.

The below table summaries some trailers:

For more information, consult the official publication here (in Chinese).

PRODUCT RECALLS / ALERTS

Below you will find a monthly summary of product recalls and alerts in Europe (Source “RAPEX”) and the U.S. (Source “CPSC”).

Europe

RAPEX (European Commission Rapid Alert System for dangerous non-food products – Alerts reported by EU national authorities).

There following 6 alerts regarding textile & leather products were reported between week 42 and week 45 of 2021.

U.S.

Between 21 October and 20 November 2021, the CPSC (Consumer Product Safety Commission) published the following recalls: 4 recalls of textile & leather products.