California Apparel News

TheU.S. Department of Agriculture has stepped into the organic fiberand apparel-labeling market with its BioPreferred program,which recently certified a number of fibers that have fashionapplications.

Firstauthorized as part of the 2002 Federal Farm Bill and laterexpanded under the 2008 Federal Farm Bill, the BioPreferred programwas created to “spur development of bio-based productsin industry,” according to Kate Lewis, deputy program managerfor the USDA, who said the program is designed to “reducethe nation’s environmental impact” and “enhancethe nation’s energy security”by promoting the use of biological componentsrather than components derivedfrom fossil fuels.

Bio-basedcomponents are those that containbiological ingredients, such as renewableplant, animal or marine materials. “Theseare plants; this is feedstock corn;it’s soy, fur, bones, proteins, marine- basedingredients, such as algae orfish,” Lewis said, adding that the BioPreferredprogram does not include food,which is covered under a different USDA standard.

Manyof the BioPreferred-certified products are for industrial orjanitorial use. Fiber falls under the category “intermediate materials”in the USDA BioPreferred database.

Todate, there are just a few fashion-related intermediate products alreadycertified, including Lenzing’s Tencel, DuPont’s Sorona and NaturallyAdvanced Technology’s Crailar Flax. “Theopportunity may seem small, but we have a number of actorsin the supply chain and brand owners investigating [the program],”Lewis said.

Becausethe program is designed to promote development of newbio-based products, longstanding biologically based materials, suchas cotton, are exempt from the program. “So you wouldn’tsee a bio-preferred T-shirt or wood furniture,” she said.

TheUSDA has created a label for the BioPreferred program, whichlists how much of the product—or the packaging—is biologically based.

Theapplication process is online (at www.biopreferred.gov), andthere’s no fee to apply. However, applicants will need to havean accredited third-party lab test the product and will be responsible forthe testing fee, which is $600 for up to three tests.

Lewissaid the department has received 1,200 applications sincethe program first launched 18 months ago. So far, 750 certifications havebeen issued and 60 submissions failed, she said.

Lewisdiscussed the USDA’s BioPreferred program at the recent TexworldUSA trade show, whichfeatured a seminar covering someof the many eco certifications available for textile andapparel products. Speakers included Lewis; Sandra Marquardt, theNorth American representative forinternational working group on Global Organic Textile Standard (GOTS);and Anne Gillespie, the director ofindustry integrity for the Textile Exchange.

GOTSis celebrating its 10-year anniversary thisyear, Marquardt said.

“Westarted this discussion 10 years agoin a castle in Germany—which soundsromantic,” she said before explaining thebasic tenets of the standard, whichcovers all organic natural fibers,including cotton wool, linen and silk.GOTS includes environmental and social criteria and addresses allprocessing stages. Plus, in addition to a “certifiedorganic” standard,which covers products that contain at least 95percent organic material, GOTS includes a “made with organic” standard.

Thereis a $150 licensing fee for certified companies.

“Thereare more than 50 U.S. companies certified, including Harmony Art, Robert Kaufman and Organic Plus,” she added.

TheTextile Exchange’s Gillespie briefly discussed several ecostandards, including the Content Claim Standard, the Global Recycled Standard, the Recycled Content Standard, the Organic Content Standard, and the Eco Index, which looksat the entire product lifecycle, measures the environmental impactand assigns a score.

Strictlyspeaking, Lewis noted, the USDA’s BioPreferred program differsfrom other eco labels. “Just because it’s bio-based doesn’tmean you can check the green box,” she said. “All these productsare generally more environmentally friendly, yes, [but there are exceptions].”—A.A.N.