Green Deal Circular Denim

Denim Deal goals

In the Denim Deal it has been agreed that brands such as, MUD Jeans, Garcia, PVH, 247 Jeans, and Kuyichi together make three million denim trousers (jeans) containing at least 20% recycled textiles. In addition, all parties have agreed that they will work together towards the standard of at least 5% recycled textile in all denim garments  they put on the market as quickly as possible and will raise the bar in the future based on the learnings of the Denim Deal.

Former State Secretary Van Veldhoven, who signed the deal in 2020 on behalf of Dutch government: ‘The strength of this Denim Deal lies in the fact that all parties involved in the making and processing of a denim garment will participate, from production companies, brands and retailers, but also collectors, sorters, cutters and weavers. We are initiating a change in the entire chain. Once that step has been taken, scaling up will be easier afterwards. That will make this Denim Deal a blueprint for making garments made from other materials more sustainable’.

Look here for the official Denim Deal text

Look here for the English version of the Denim Deal text

Look here for the publication of the Denim Deal in the Government Gazette (Staatscourant) with the signatories until 1 July 2023.

Read the latest news about the Denim Deal.

Learn more about the Denim Deal

Are you interested in learning more about the Denim Deal? Have a look at the booklet Lessons of the Denim Deal 2020-2023 (pdf, 3.9 MB) or watch the after movie of the Denim Deal closure event. For an overview of the state of the art for using post-consumer recycled cotton in denim, have a look at this technical report (pdf, 3.6 MB).

Denim Deal Coalition Partners

The Denim Deal will run for three years (October 2020 – December 2023) as an alliance of international frontrunners in the denim industry. Here, you can find the most recent overview of both public and private parties that have signed the Denim Deal (pdf, 404 kB).

photo Rosa van Ederen

Monitoring

The signatories of the Denim monitor annually the activities they have undertaken, the results achieved, and their effect and challenges towards achieving the goals of the Denim Deal.

The monitoring system consists of both quantitative monitoring measured as progress towards the set ambitions, as well as qualitative monitoring in the form of questionnaires.
The first quantitative baseline report (pdf, 9.1 MB) 2020 shows the departure point for the Denim Deal. The monitor on 2021 (pdf, 2.9 MB) and the monitor on 2022 show the results in the first two years of the Denim Deal. The final monitor report contains  a summary of the 2023 results and the challenges of the whole period that the Denim Deal was running.

Steering Committee

The steering committee’s primary task is to oversee general progress towards the objectives and agreements as stated in the Denim Deal, and to organise, facilitate and coordinate any necessary joint activities required to achieve these objectives and agreements. The steering committee consists of the following parties:

• Representative of Ministry of I&W                              Miriam van de Kamp
• Representative of local authorities                             Marten Boels (Metropolital Region of Amsterdam)
• Representative of the brands/retailers                     Nicolas Prophte (PVH)
• Representative of waste processing companies Jan Lamme (former CEO of Lamme Textiles and CEO Cibutex)
• Representative of the spinners/weavers                 Besim ÖZEK (Bossa)
• Representative of manufacturers                               Romain Narcy (Ereks Garment)
• Coordinator                                                                              Roosmarie Ruigrok*

* The contribution of Amsterdam municipal authority to the role of the coordinator was supported untill June 2022 by the horizon2020 Reflow Project.

photo Rosa van Ederen

Working Groups

Participants of the Denim Deal are organized in working groups to collaborate on specific challenges within the textile industry. There are four working groups:

Transport

How to come to a better transport of goods from the Netherlands to other countries?

Parties experience problems with the shipment of non-wearable textiles to other countries. Parties within this working group will work together in order to come up with solutions for the shipment.

Update December 2022:

It is important to develop a sustainable strategy under what requirements non-wearable discarded garments (textile waste) can be exported to production countries where these can be recycled in fibres that can be used in spinning, weaving, and manufacturing of clothing and other textile products. The requirements should guarantee an environmentally responsible (better) treatment, authorised economic operators and a smart and efficient administrative process, to prevent unnecessary hurdles in the export of these secondary materials to the production companies which need those materials to become fully circular.

The plan (coordinated by the international department of the Dutch Ministry of Environment (IenW) is to involve the following stakeholders from Türkiye and the Netherlands:

• policy departments of the Ministries for the Environment,
• their Environmental Inspectorates, and
• the Customs offices.

Together they can investigate how the two countries could set up a system that would meet all the requirements, as stated above.

Quality

How to come to 3 million jeans with 20% PCR with the quality requirements of the brands?

At present, the use of recycled materials is often accompanied with price increases. The Denim Deal should develop new business models so that the deployment of PCR cotton in denim will become common use.

Update December 2022:

Many innovations are being developed and shared through denim and jeans fairs like Kingpins. For example, many brands are working with mechanical recycling combined with chemical recycling to achieve higher quality and percentage PCR without compromising the quality standards of the particular brand. The aim to use 20% in jeans and minimal 5% in other denim garments are easily reached at the moment. When only using mechanical recycling, the 20% PCR is currently the norm.

photo Rosa van Ederen

Transparency

What is the best way to be transparent about your activities to come to a circular business without green washing?

Transparency is important in order to show consumers that PCR cotton is actually incorporated into the Denim. This working group focuses on the question which communication tools can be used to inform consumers about the PCR cotton content of the clothing. There are several instruments already available on the market. Which instruments best suit the needs of the stakeholders involved in the Denim Deal?

Update July 2023:

With guidance from Retail partners, we looked at community-driven transparency for the partners within the denim deal. It became clear that the chain partners often use their own tools for this purpose. Full transparency in the chain is currently only common practice at product level and at individual brands. The NEN organized in May 2023 a workshop to find consensus on which requirements a transparency tool should have.

Guidelines Development fibers

Lead by: Jan Lamme, Nicolas Prophte, Laura Vicaria

How to enable effective collection and recycling of discarded textiles in order to facilitate access to high quality fibers?

The aim is to build a set of guidelines to bring alignment and facilitate the movement of sorted garments and recycled textile waste. The development brings specialists with technical knowledge of Denim Deal stakeholders together. The focus on developing guidelines is from the perspective of spinners, recyclers and sorters.