Recover’s team reflects on Textile Exchange Conference 2025 “Shifting Landscapes”

What a week!

Last week concluded the 2025 edition of the Textile Exchange Conference, the leading event that gathers the global sustainability community for three days of collaboration, insight, and collective learning. This year, the conference welcomed around 1,600 participants from across the value chain: textile suppliers, brands, fiber producers, sustainability experts, NGOs, and more.

All gathered under the theme “Shifting Landscapes,” which explored how the industry must adapt to rapidly evolving environmental, political, and economic conditions. The theme emphasized the urgent need for systemic transformation across global supply chains.

The Recover™ team, stationed at booth 26, connected with brands, clients and peers to discuss recycled materials, supply chain integration, sustainability strategies, and industry-wide challenges. After three days of inspiring discussions, workshops, and networking sessions, we asked our Sustainability, R&D, Commercial, and Marketing teams to share their view on the conference.

Discover in this article our five highlights of the event:

Highlight One: Update on Textile Exchange’s Materials Matter

Textile Exchange unveiled an updated approach to partnerships as part of its forthcoming Materials Matter System, which will be voluntary by December 2026 and mandatory by December 2027. Materials Matter is a new sustainability framework designed to unify and elevate how raw materials are produced and processed across the fashion, textile, and apparel industry. Rather than focusing on individual material certifications, the system takes a holistic, outcomes-driven approach that supports climate goals, human rights, animal welfare, and ecological health.

The initiative consolidates existing standards, such as RWS, RMS, RAS, RDS, GRS, and OCS, into a single, integrated system that applies across a wide range of materials. This shift aims to simplify certification processes for suppliers and brands while driving greater impact and accountability across the supply chain.

The announcement sparked meaningful conversations at the conference, especially around how brands and suppliers can prepare for the transition and align their sourcing strategies with the new framework.

Highlight Two: What’s the Global Fiber Situation? Insights from the Materials Market Report

Textile Exchange referenced day one of the conference its newly published Materials Market Report, offering a cautiously optimistic outlook. Global fiber production reached a record 132 million tonnes in 2024, up from 125 million tonnes in 2023. If current trends continue, production is projected to hit 169 million tonnes by 2030, with polyester driving most of the growth. Polyester now holds a 59% market share (+2 pts vs. previous year), while cotton, the second-most used fiber, declined slightly to 24.5 million tonnes, representing 19% of global fiber production (-0.9 pts vs. previous year).

Recycled cotton accounted for an estimated 0.3 million tonnes in 2024, roughly 1% of total cotton production. Textile Exchange continues to clarify that mechanically recycled cotton is the focus of this data, while chemically recycled cotton is categorized under manmade cellulosic fibers (MMCFs) in the report. Speaking of, MMCFs made from recycled feedstocks (including any recycled cellulosic fiber) reached 0.09 million tonnes in 2024. Meanwhile, recycled polyester grew from 8.9 million tonnes in 2023 to 9.3 million tonnes in 2024, with 98% still coming from PET plastic bottles. That leaves textile-to-textile recycled polyester at just 2%, or approximately 0.186 million tonnes. Other textile-to-textile recycling volumes remain low: recycled wool totaled 83,000 tonnes, and recycled MMCFs are still emerging. For now, mechanically recycled cotton remains the only textile-to-textile recycled material with significant volume in the global fiber landscape.

Highlight Three: Textile-to-Textile as an Opportunity to Decarbonize Supply Chains

Textile Exchange emphasized that textile-to-textile recycling presents a clear opportunity for “regeneration-led growth, where business objectives align with, rather than compete against, sustainability goals”. It’s one of the few tangible ways for brands to reduce reliance on virgin resources and embrace circularity at scale.

To unlock this potential, creating waste streams and collaborating across the value chain to recycle textile waste is essential. One of the main sessions explored post-consumer waste streams by country, alongside business strategies focused on reverse logistics and circular business models. At Recover™, we see post-consumer textile recycling as a shared industry challenge that requires collective action. For more on our perspective, check out our article: Are clothes recyclable? Unveiling clothing recycling.

Speaking of textile-to-textile and collection action, we’re thrilled to share that Recover™ Central America has won the Climate and Nature Impact Award for Textile-to-Textile Partnership at the 2025 Textile Exchange Conference in Lisbon!

This recognition celebrates our collaboration with our new strategic partners Intradeco at Recover™ Central America, our facility in El Salvador where we’re scaling recycled cotton production across the Western Hemisphere and integrating it into global supply chains. Such a testament to our work to drive textile-to-textile recycling and close the loop on fashion.

On another note, Reverse Resources, Textile Exchange, Fashion for Good and TEXroad also shared the first results from their ongoing project called T2T recycled Fiber 2030. The project aims to conduct a textile waste study the EU Commission’s can use to create recycled content targets through a data-driven and repeatable model.

Set for completion in Q4 2025 and publication in early 2026, the study will analyze textile waste volume, types, and characteristics across the globe. It aims to improve data accuracy, optimize collection systems, and enable more efficient circular textile solutions as part of the EU’s broader Textile Strategy. So far, the participants of the project have estimated recyclable post-industrial waste is estimated at 19 million tonnes across 28 countries.

Highlight four: Legislation is one the way – industry must adapt

The textile sector is increasingly subject to tighter regulation, particularly within the EU. At the conference, attendees discussed how the EU’s efforts to simplify legislation, such as through the Omnibus Directive, aim to reduce administrative burdens, but also introduce new layers of uncertainty for businesses and may slow down the adoption of recycled materials. In this rapidly evolving landscape, proactive policy engagement, close monitoring of legislative developments, and advocacy for standards that enable circular systems are becoming essential business strategies. Recover™ is actively engaged in several key industry memberships to ensure our voice is heard in this shifting political landscape and to contribute our expertise as textile-to-textile recyclers.

Several major legislative updates are set to reshape the industry:

• Revised Waste Framework Directive (WFD): Entered into force in October 2025, introducing mandatory Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) schemes for textiles and footwear across all Member States. Producers will be required to finance collection, sorting, and recycling, with fees modulated based on sustainability criteria like durability and recyclability.
• Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation (ESPR): A cornerstone of the EU’s sustainable product strategy, ESPR expands ecodesign rules to textiles and introduces Digital Product Passports (DPPs). These passports will store and share product data , including material composition, environmental impact, and recyclability, to improve transparency and traceability across the supply chain. Implementation for textiles is expected to begin in 2027, with product-specific requirements rolling out in 2028.
• Circular Economy Act (expected in 2026): A flagship initiative under the European Green Deal, this act aims to accelerate the transition to a circular economy across key sectors, including textiles. It will reinforce product design requirements, promote fiber-to-fiber recycling, and restrict the destruction of unsold goods. The act also supports the development of reuse and repair services and sets ambitious targets for reducing textile waste.

Highlight Five: Traceability and Transparency — Building Trust Through Data

Traceability and transparency continue to be central themes in the textile industry's journey toward circularity — and were widely discussed at the Textile Exchange Conference. As brands face increasing pressure from consumers, regulators, and investors to prove the sustainability of their products, the ability to track fiber origin, production processes, and environmental impact is no longer optional — it's strategic.

Recover™ has long advocated for data-backed sustainability, recognizing that traceability is key to scaling textile-to-textile recycling. From mapping post-industrial and post-consumer waste streams to collaborating with partners on digital traceability tools, our goal is to ensure that recycled materials are not only sustainable but also verifiable.

We also exchanged with other fiber producers on the collective need to push for greater traceability and transparency across the sector. This is essential to prevent issues such as counterfeiting, inflated recycled content claims, and unclear waste origins or recycling technologies. More transparency would not only build trust across the value chain but also facilitate the adoption of truly circular materials — ensuring that sustainability claims are backed by verifiable data and robust systems.

Textile Exchange is developing a centralized traceability platform to support the transition to the Materials Matter System and streamline traceability for the industry. The system integrates dTrackit (TCs) and eTrackit (eTransactions) to form an ecosystem of transaction data between brands, supply chain partners, and Certification Bodies, with the ability to integrate with other programs through future recognition partnerships.

This move reinforces Textile Exchange’s goal of building fully traceable and accountable value chains from fiber to finished product.

Looking Ahead

This year’s Textile Exchange Conference underscored a shared industry vision: accelerating impact through innovation, transparency, and cooperation.

As Recover™, we’re inspired by the conversations and partnerships forged in Lisbon and remain committed to scaling circular solutions that make textile-to-textile recycling the new standard. Let’s keep this circular movement moving!