Cotton and wool bodies plead for rethink as EU votes on PEF
17/06/2024
They said: “The PEF methodology unfairly favours synthetic, fossil fuel-derived materials over natural fibres, misrepresenting natural fibres as harmful to the environment and therefore posing a significant risk of injustice to farmers whose lives depend on the production of these natural fibres.
“Farmers are already presented with significant challenges as a result of climate change, including constantly recurring crises and uncertainties. If the EU introduces policy that favours cheap, synthetic fibres used by the fast fashion industry, the struggle for farmers will become even more severe and they may have no option but to give up on farming practices and providing food and fibre to humanity.
“While we fully support meaningful sustainability labelling of clothing products based on accurate and complete methodologies, it is clear that the PEF methodology is not adequate to assess the environmental performance of agricultural products and will therefore enable greenwashing by fast fashion brands.
“It is also important to highlight that the Technical Secretariat for the PEFCR for Apparel and Footwear has set a prohibitively high cost to participate in the voting process, meaning that only large brands with ample funding can afford to be a voting member. None of the 26 members are farmers. In fact, decisions are voted on and agreed by a two-thirds majority - there are 14 total voting members, 8 of which have a synthetic business model to protect. This highlights the extreme disadvantage for farmers like us up against the well-funded and powerful fast fashion industry.”
The letter has more than 600 signatories representing hundreds of thousands of farmers.
Similarly, the Make the Label Count coalition, which includes the US Cotton Trust Protocol, reiterated its concerns: “The current PEF and subsequent Category Rules are incomplete and risk misguiding well-intended consumers and becoming a greenwashing tool that the legislation is aiming to avoid. The PEFCR for apparel and footwear, for example, considerably downplay the benefits of using renewable, biodegradable materials like natural fibres and score fossil-fuel based materials like polyester better. The reason for this being fundamental flaws in the PEF methodology that can, and must, be improved.
“We have expressed our concerns to Council representatives, asking them to reconsider the emphasis on PEF in the Green Claims Directive and to ensure that any methodology used for substantiating environmental claims is comprehensive, science-based and credible.”
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