The Fashion Pact and Fashion for Good launch Circular Fibre Collective

A new cross-industry initiative has been launched by major players in the circular fashion world that have set out to accelerate the adoption and scaling of textile-to-textile (T2T) recycled and next generation fibres.

The UK’s Fashion Pact and Dutch organisation Fashion for Good have come together to introduce the Circular Fibre Collective, an initiative addressing barriers identified in the currently “disconnected” supply and demand landscape for T2T fibres.

The organisations, acting with strategic insight from the Ellen MacArthur Foundation, said factors like fragmented demand, insufficient financing, a lack of well-developed recycling infrastructure and supportive policy frameworks was impeding the widespread adoption of such materials across fashion, requiring a collaborative approach to move forward.

According to a report by the Boston Consulting Group and Fashion for Good, however, up to two million tonnes of associated material could be achieved if fully mobilised across the sector. This, in turn, would help grow the share of these materials in global fibre production from less than 1 percent to 8 percent by 2030.

Through the collective, the organisations are providing a framework for brands and suppliers to facilitate voluntary forms of demand and create space for investment and supportive policies, striving for the mission of instilling more confidence in innovators, suppliers, and financiers to scale and invest in circular fibre solutions.

Two pillars form the collective’s framework. ‘Adoption enablers’, overseen by The Fashion Pact, zooms in on building voluntary forms of aggregated demand and supporting non-binding commitments.

‘Practical adoption tools’, meanwhile, intend to help brands overcome commercial barriers to adoption. These will include Fashion for Good’s Fibre Club and Toolkit, each pushing for commercialisation.