What is France’s anti-waste law and what do I need to do as a Connected Retail partner?
Find out who is impacted by the new anti-waste (AGEC) law in France and what steps you need to take to comply with it.
New French environmental legislation, known as the AGEC law, was implemented on January 1st, 2023. The law requires companies who put products on the French market, and are therefore considered importers or marketers under this legislation, to provide anti-waste data points in a ‘product sheet’.
Important
The impact of the law is limited to Connected Retail partners selling in the French market.
1. What is France’s new anti-waste law?
The anti-waste law in France, officially known as the Loi AGEC (Loi Anti-gaspillage pour une économie circulaire), requires every product marketed or imported in France after January 1, 2023 to be accompanied by a ‘product sheet’ which provides compulsory sustainability and circularity information of the items.
The new law defines the terms and conditions for the application of article L. 541-9-1 of the Environment Code, which requires producers and importers to provide consumers with accurate information on the environmental qualities and characteristics of waste-generating products.
2. Who is considered an importer or marketer?
Under the legislation, an importer is someone selling products that have been manufactured outside the EU in the French market. A marketer is someone selling products manufactured inside the EU in the French market. There is no difference between what data points you need to provide whether you are considered an importer or marketer.
3. What are the implications for Zalando Connected Retail partners?
Connected Retail partners selling products in France via Zalando are considered marketers or importers of these products in the French market. Under this new legislation, any of those products sold in the French market must now include a detailed ‘product sheet’.
Producers and importers who declare an annual turnover of more than €10 million for the products referred to in article R. 541-221 that they place in the French market and who are responsible for placing more than 10,000 units of these products on the market each year are subject to this providing this information.
This information is provided by making data available electronically and, where applicable, in accordance with procedures defined by order, by display, labeling or any other legible and comprehensible device, at the time of purchase. The format in which data relating to these environmental qualities and characteristics is made available to consumers must be easy to understand.
These environmental qualities and characteristics include, depending on the product categories concerned, the incorporation of recycled material, the use of renewable resources, durability, compostability, reparability, reusability, recyclability, the presence of hazardous substances, precious metals or rare earths, traceability and the presence of plastic microfibres.
4. What Zalando product categories are included in this legislation?
For Partner Program partners, the following product categories for mens, womens and kidswear are included:
Textile
Sports textile
Underwear
Beachwear
Shoes
Sports shoes
Primary packaging for all products
Each product that belong to each of those categories sold on Zalando in France must include information about:
Traceability for textiles (e.g. country of weaving),
Traceability for shoes (e.g. country of stitching),
Plastic microfiber contents (e.g. products containing more than 50% of synthetic fiber)
Recycled content
Packaging type (this refers to the primary packaging only. Secondary packaging is not included in the definition).
Each of the mandatory data points can be provided to Zalando as specific article attributes in the template. Each attribute is outlined in more detail below.
5. What do I need to do?
For Connected Retail partners, you can provide the required information to Zalando via the template attached below. Once you have filled in the template, send it to our Partner Care team and they will be able to upload the data for you, or if need be, clarify any questions you may have.
It is also possible to provide the product sheet information via your own channels, for example, your own website. Once the information is provided on one platform, it is not required to provide it on other platforms too. This means that if the product sheets are completed and available on your own website, you don’t need to provide this additional information to Zalando too.
Important
The template should only include products sold in the French market.
The current product categories are limited to the textile and shoe categories listed above. Other categories are currently excluded from the product sheet requirements, but may be added at a later stage.
6. What information do I need to provide?
The template contains one sheet for Textile articles, and one sheet for Shoes. Each of the data points that must be provided are listed as attributes in the template. Please find each attribute, the definition and which product categories it applies to explained in the table below.
Attribute | Definition | Applicable to Textiles | Applicable to Shoes |
|---|---|---|---|
coo_manufacturing_product | Country of assembly, including but not limited to, stitching (sewing), linking for flat knits | Yes | Yes |
coo_stitching_product | Stitching of the components (e.g. upper). If multiple processes are applied in different countries, take the final country of stitching. | Yes | Yes |
contains_more_50_synthetic_microfibers_product | If the weight of the synthetic materials is over 50% of the net weight of the finished product. In cases where a calculation on net weight basis is not possible or only with disproportionate effort, we recommend a conservative approach (in case of doubt: YES). | Yes | Yes |
recycled_content_total_product_weight_percentage | % by weight of total recycled materials which is present at least in the net weight of the product. | Yes | Yes |
coo_weaving_knitting_primary_component | Country of the fabric weaving or fabric knitting of the primary component (heaviest textile component). | Yes | No |
coo_dyeing_printing_primary_component | Country of the dyeing or printing at fabric or yarn level (knits/wovens, yarn dyeing for flat knits or fabric prints). If dyeing and printing processes happen in different countries, the country of the dyeing process shall be considered. | Yes | No |
recycled_content_total_product_weight_percentage | % by weight of total recycled materials which is present at least in the net weight of the product. | Yes | Yes |
packaging_type_one_type
packaging_type_recycled_content_one_percentage | % of recycled content which is present at least in plastic product packaging (such as polybags) Note: This refers to the primary (product) packaging only. Secondary (shipping) packaging is not included in the definition. | Yes | Yes |
packaging_type_two_type
packaging_type_recycled_content_two_percentage | % of recycled content which is present at least in paper/cardboard product packaging (such as shoeboxes, lingerie boxes; this is excluding hang tags) Note: This refers to the primary (product) packaging only. Secondary (shipping) packaging is not included in the definition. | Yes | Yes |
7. How do I provide this information to Zalando?
Download the template at the bottom of this article.
Please fill in the relevant information for all Textile and Shoe articles you sell in the French market.
Once you have completed the template, send it to Partner Care via the contact form. In the contact form, please select Category: Article onboarding > Request type: Content updates.
If you have any questions, please reach out to Partner Care here.
Download (attached in the section): France anti-waste law: article update template