Textiles Sector

The textiles sector has high cultural and economic importance, providing livelihoods and a sense of identity for millions, while simultaneously posing risks to workers and the environment at every stage of the life cycle.   

The UNEP Textile Initiative provides strategic leadership and encourages sector-wide collaboration to accelerate a just transition towards a sustainable and circular textile value chain. UNEP’s work includes supporting and informing governments, addressing overproduction and overconsumption and assisting actors along the textiles value chain, including SMEs, in integrating life cycle approaches to address the key environmental hotspots, avoiding trade-offs. This includes a focus on phasing out hazardous chemicals. 

In the efforts to address the three planetary environmental crises, the textile sector is growingly subject to compliance demands nationally as well as for exports. Integrating circular practices by using a life-cycle approach will help businesses and governments improve the sector’s competitiveness and market access.  

Our Approach 

We are taking a stepwise approach to integrating life cycle thinking into the textiles sector: 

• Identifying Hotspots: Through the Stocktaking Report (2020), we mapped environmental and socio-economic hotspots across the textiles value chain, identifying key areas for action. 
• Developing a Global Roadmap: The Roadmap Report (2023) and its annexes provides a comprehensive plan for stakeholders to address these hotspots, with tailored actions for brands, policymakers, innovators, and more.  
• Promoting Sustainable Communication: The Sustainable Fashion Communication Playbook (2023) guides communicators, influencers, and brands in shifting narratives towards sustainable and circular solutions, countering greenwashing, and emphasizing science-based decisions. 
• Supporting Compliance and Capacity Building: Through projects like InTex, we are strengthening the capacity of governments and businesses (especially SMEs) in countries like Kenya, South Africa, Tunisia, India, and Indonesia. This includes training on Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology, circular business models, and policy development to accelerate the transition to circularity. 
• Advancing Science-Based Policies: We develop knowledge and facilitate exchanges in the form of LCA meta-studies, policy briefs, policy dialogues to further equipping governments with science-based information to create effective textiles policies.  
• Enhancing LCA Data Availability: We support the development of LCA databases for textiles (e.g., cotton and polyester value chains) and maintain the Global LCA Data Access Network (GLAD). GLAD enables stakeholders to share and access Life Cycle Inventory datasets, improving data interoperability and supporting global efforts towards circularity. 

Join Us in Transforming the Textiles Sector 

By adopting a life cycle approach, we can reduce the environmental footprint of textiles, promote circularity, and create a more sustainable future. Explore our resources, join our Life Cycle Initiative, and connect with us to be part of the change. To stay updated with UNEP textile-related work, you can also subscribe to the monthly newsletter here.