The European Union has published the new legislation on textile labelling in the Official Journal on 18th October 2011.
Regulation 1007/2011 on textile fibre names and related labelling and marking of the fibre composition of textile products will become legislation 20 days after the publication.
This regulation consolidates all the previous directives and, hence, simplifies all the requirements under one regulation. The requirements governing the methods of determining fiber content and the rules for labelling textile product had been contained in several different directives.
The requirements of the Regulation are largely unchanged but there are several implications that clothing suppliers and retailers need to be aware of.
One of the main changes of the new regulation to impact on retailers and suppliers of apparel is a requirement which makes it mandatory to indentify any non textile part of animal origin which may be included in a product.
Any use of animal-derived materials will have to be clearly stated on textile product labels. The product label is required to display the wording "Contains non-textile parts of animal origin".
There is also a process for new fibres to be added to Annex I has been included in the Regulation. This should allow new fibres to be added to the generic list of names without the need for a change in the legislation.
The legislation has been approved as a regulation, which means that it is not necessary to be approved by member states.
The Regulation will become legislation in 20 day, but it will be effective 8 May 2012. Any goods which are placed on the market after that date will need to comply with the new requirements.
There will be a transition period for all goods which are placed on the market before 8 May 2012. The transition period will be until 9 November 2014.
Directives 73/44/EEC, 96/73/EC and 2008/121/EC are repealed by the new regulation with effect from 8 May 2012.
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