The Australian Fashion Council has led a Consortium to create a national stewardship scheme called Seamless, that aims to make Australian fashion and clothing truly circular, and significantly reduce the 200,000 tonnes of clothing that currently goes to Australian landfill each year.
On average, every Australian buys 56 items of clothing yearly, most of which are made from non-sustainable, non-durable materials. Also, Australia has no systematic resources for the collection of unwearable clothing. As a result, clothing waste has become one of the largest contributors to Australia’s waste problem.
No single organisation can address these issues alone, so the Australian Fashion Council has led a Consortium to design a scheme that aims to make Australian fashion truly circular by transforming outdated business models, driving innovation, changing citizen behaviour and recycling clothing in high value applications.
Seamless is a clothing stewardship scheme which recognises that the fashion and clothing brands who place clothes on the market are responsible for the entire life of that garment, from design through to recycling or sustainable disposal.
The pioneering and progressive brands that are the foundation members of Seamless are BIG W, David Jones, Lorna Jane, Rip Curl, R.M. Williams and THE ICONIC. Each organisation will play an important part in the 12-month transition phase while Seamless is established.
The Australian clothing industry manufactures and imports over 1.4 billion units of new clothing into Australia every year. Clothing waste has become one of the largest contributors to Australia's waste crisis, with more than 200,000 tonnes of clothing ending up in Australian landfill every year. Find out more in the Clothing Data Report and the Global Scan Report.
Australia has no systematic mechanism for the collection of unwearable clothing, and almost no clothing and textiles reprocessing. Our reuse and resale sectors are overwhelmed with unwearable donations costing millions of dollars in sorting and landfill fees.
The Australian Government recognises these issues and in 2021, clothing textiles were placed on the Federal Minister’s Priority List for Product Stewardship, with industry required to take action to reduce the volume of clothing sent to landfill.
That’s why the Australian Government funded a consortium to develop Seamless, a National Clothing Product Stewardship Scheme that considers action across the entire value chain, from clothing design to use, reuse, collection, and recycling.
The Australian Fashion Council led a consortium with members from Charitable Recycling Australia, Queensland University of Technology, Sustainable Resource Use and Wrap Asia Pacific to create Seamless, Australia’s first National Clothing Product Stewardship Scheme.
The scheme design recommends that Seamless is funded by a 4 cent per garment levy paid by clothing brands and retailers who become members of the scheme. If 60% of the market by volume sign up to the scheme, a funding pool of $36 million will be raised per year to transform the industry.
The funds raised as part of Seamless will drive the industry towards clothing circularity by 2030 through incentivising clothing design that is more durable and recyclable, fostering new circular business models and expanding clothing collection, sorting and recycling.
Seamless will also encourage citizen behaviour change for clothing acquisition, use, care and disposal through national and regional education campaigns, and access to infrastructure and services that make it easy to care for clothes and extend their use.
Want to know how you can contribute now? Make the pledge to join the journey to clothing circularity and be the first to receive updates on the transformation.
By 2030, how Australians acquire, use and dispose of their clothing will be very different. While it may look the same on the surface, the wardrobe of the future will represent responsible stewardship and citizenship from clothing design and production, through to consumption and recirculation.
In 2030, our wardrobes will contain fewer clothes, most of which will be made to last from renewable fibre. Many items will be enjoying a second life, or will have found their way into the wardrobe from new sources like rental. It will be standard practice for less durable items (such as underwear) to be made from recycled materials.
The Roadmap to Clothing Circularity guides a just transition of the Australian clothing industry to circularity by 2030. It informs and educates all stakeholders across the clothing value chain, inspires businesses and citizens to act quickly and aligns with Australian Government sustainability goals.
View the Roadmap
This report summarises the recommendations of the Seamless consortium and provides an overview of the Seamless scheme design including its scope, objectives, benefits, revenue, expenditure, and stakeholder roles and responsibilities.
View the Summary Report
The full report provides detailed, in-depth recommendations for the Seamless scheme design including an analysis of the Australian clothing value chain, the roles of stakeholders, the approach to target setting, and priority areas and operations.
View the Full Report
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