From Epr to the fight against ultra fast fashion: rules in progress in Europe and Italy

While the Omnibus package of measures - the first of which was approved yesterday in Brussels - has conspicuously reduced the perimeter or postponed the timeframe for the application of some of the most important regulations of the European Green Deal (Csrd, Csddd), the path towards the construction of a European circular economy is by no means archived. First of all, on 6 November the public consultation on the Circular Economy Act, which should see the light of day in 2026, ended. On 16 October, on the other hand, the revision of the Waste Framework Directive came into force, introducing at European level extended producer responsibility also in the textile sector. A regulation that should push towards a more correct and effective implementation of the obligation, in force from 1 January 2025, of separate collection of textiles, imposed precisely by the European Union. Every year 12.6 million tonnes of textile waste are generated in EU countries (about 12 kilos per person). But only 1% of this waste is currently recycled

Italy has anticipated the introduction of this obligation by a good three years: it is in fact in force as of 1 January 2022. In the same measure, our country had - in a pioneering way - also introduced EPR (extended producer responsibility) for textiles, relying on a series of consortia that came into being as of 2022 for the collection and recycling of products. The system, however, has never been fully operational: there is no inter-ministerial decree (Ministry of the Environment and Mimit) regulating the activities of the consortia and, therefore, making the rule operational. After several drafts of the decree and a gestation period of about three years, according to Laura D'Aprile, head of Mase's department for ecological transition and green investments at the Venice Sustainable Fashion Summit 2025, the decree should see the light by the first quarter of 2026.

In the meantime, while the package of anti ultra fast fashion regulations (contained among the amendments to the ddl Concorrenza, approved without amendments by the Senate and now being debated in the House) has been forcibly put on standby, the government has approved the legislative decree transposing directive 2024/825 on 'empowering consumers for the green transition'. The aim of the measure, which from 1 January prevents the use of generic slogans such as 'eco' and 'green' without certification support, is to allow consumers to make the most informed choice possible without being misled by opaque messages. Practices that should have been banned outright by the Green Claims directive, but whose path was interrupted in mid-2025 with the withdrawal of the proposal.

At the Ecofin, however, the economy ministers of the 27 approved the abolition of the 'de minimis' exemption to customs tariffs on goods worth less than EUR 150 purchased in non-European countries. The rule should enter into force in 2028, but given the urgency of the matter (the US abolished the de minimis in August), a commitment was put in black and white at the summit to approve a 'bridging solution' to trigger the measure before the new European customs hub is operational and hopefully as early as 2026. Taxation on small parcels - even if it were one or two euros per parcel - could be a deterrent against purchases of ultra fast fashion products.