Public buyers in the EU spend a serious share of GDP on goods, and a meaningful part of that is textiles: uniforms, workwear, hospital linen, school and municipal supply. On 28 August 2026 the Commission put an entry in its register for an implementing act setting green public procurement criteria for apparel textiles. It is the first public movement on apparel in that register since December 2025, and it points at a channel most brands have not planned for.
What appeared, and what it is
Entry 19133 in the Commission register of initiatives, reference Ares(2026)8097757, published there on 28 August 2026. It is an implementing act, not a delegated one, and the legal basis recorded against it is Article 65 of the ESPR - the ecodesign regulation's green public procurement article.
The entry is at the earliest stage. The draft act is listed as upcoming, no feedback window has opened, and there were zero responses when we checked on 1 September 2026. There is no draft text to read yet.
What Article 65 lets the Commission do
This is the part worth reading properly, because it is more forceful than "criteria" suggests.
Article 65(1) says contracting authorities and contracting entities shall, in compliance with the procurement directives, award public contracts complying with the minimum requirements set under this article - for the purchase of products covered by delegated acts adopted under Article 4, and for works or services where those products are used.
Article 65(3) then says how those minimum requirements can be shaped. The Commission sets them by implementing act, and it may take any of four forms: technical specifications, award criteria, contract performance conditions, or targets. Two numbers appear in the text:
- Award criteria shall, where appropriate, carry a minimum weighting of between 15 % and 30 % in the award process.
- Targets shall require, annually or over several years, that at least 50 % of procurement - at the level of an individual authority or aggregated nationally - is of the most environmentally sustainable products.
And the benchmark is not a floor. Minimum requirements are to be based on the two highest performance classes, the highest scores, or where those do not exist, the best possible performance levels set out in the delegated act for that product group.
Fifteen to thirty per cent of an award decision is not a tie-breaker. In a tender where price and quality are otherwise close, it decides the outcome.
Update 8 October 2026. On 9 September 2026 the Commission proposed a Public Procurement Act, COM(2026) 590, one regulation to replace the three procurement directives. Its Article 147 would delete Article 65 of the ESPR and move the green procurement empowerment to a new Article 54, under which the Commission would specify by delegated act the environmental characteristics public buyers must require. The text of Article 54 does not repeat the 15 % to 30 % weighting, the 50 % target or the two-highest-classes benchmark described above. It is a proposal: until Parliament and Council adopt it and it applies, Article 65 is the law, and initiative 19133 still rests on it.
The dependency almost everyone will miss
Read Article 65(1) again: it applies to products covered by delegated acts adopted pursuant to Article 4. The green procurement criteria are chained to the product delegated act. No ecodesign act for apparel, no products in scope, nothing for the criteria to attach to.
And that act is entry 16116 in the same register, "Ecodesign requirements for sustainable and circular apparel textiles". Its record has not changed since 12 December 2025. Every stage is still listed as upcoming and it has collected no feedback, because no window has opened.
So the honest description is this: the Commission has opened the procurement file before the act that gives it products to work with. That is a sequencing signal, not an obligation. Nobody's tender is going to score ecodesign performance next spring because of this entry.
One methodological caveat we apply to ourselves as well: a register record's modification date describes the record, not the work inside the Commission. Eight months of stillness in the register proves an absence of public traces, not an absence of drafting.
Why this still changes your planning
Because of what it tells you about the shape of the landing, not the date of it.
The default assumption about the textile passport is that it is a cost: you collect data, you publish it, you tick a box, and the money side is unaffected. Article 65 says that when the delegated act lands, a demand-side instrument lands with it, and that instrument converts exactly the same data into tender points and, potentially, into a 50 % quota that a public buyer has to hit somehow.
If you sell to public buyers - and workwear, uniform, institutional and hospitality suppliers frequently do - the data you build for the passport becomes the data your bid is scored on. That is the first mechanism in this whole framework that pays you back rather than costing you.
It also changes who inside your company should care. A compliance obligation is a job for whoever handles product documentation. A tender scoring criterion is a job for whoever writes bids, and that person usually does not read ecodesign news.
What this is not
- It is not a new obligation for manufacturers. Article 65 binds contracting authorities. It reaches you through what buyers ask for, not through a duty imposed on you directly.
- It does not create an earlier deadline than the ecodesign act. The criteria cannot apply to products that no delegated act covers.
- It does not mean apparel is regulated now. The textile delegated act is expected around 2027, with enforcement expected later. Nothing in this entry moves that.
- It is not a draft you can read. There is no text, no window and no closing date yet.
How to check this yourself
Two register entries, both public:
https://ec.europa.eu/info/law/better-regulation/brpapi/groupInitiatives/19133?language=EN for the procurement criteria, and .../16116?language=EN for the apparel ecodesign act they depend on. Compare the modifiedDate fields and the stage list on each.
Article 65 itself is free to read in the ESPR at https://eur-lex.europa.eu/eli/reg/2024/1781/oj/eng. The 15 % to 30 % weighting and the 50 % target are in paragraph 3, in the regulation's own words.
What to do this quarter
- Find out whether you sell into public procurement at all, including indirectly through a distributor who bids. Many brands do without tracking it as a segment.
- Ask your bid writer what a 20 % sustainability weighting would do to your win rate in the tenders you already lose narrowly. That number is your business case, and it is not a compliance number.
- Collect the data that is scoreable, not just the data that is mandatory. Article 65 rewards the top performance classes, so a passport that only proves you meet the minimum wins nothing.
- Put entry 19133 on a watch list and check it quarterly. When a draft appears, the feedback window will be about four weeks.
FAQ
Does this apply to private buyers?
No. Article 65 is about contracting authorities and contracting entities under the EU procurement directives. Private buyers copy public criteria often enough that it spreads, but that is market behaviour, not law.
Will the criteria require a digital product passport specifically?
Unknown. Article 65 ties minimum requirements to the product aspects addressed in the delegated act. If those aspects are documented in a passport, that is where a buyer will look, but no text says so yet.
We are outside the EU and sell into it. Does this reach us?
Yes, through the buyer. A contracting authority applies its criteria to what it buys, regardless of where the supplier is established.
Is this the textile act everyone has been waiting for?
No. That is entry 16116, and it has not moved since December 2025. This one depends on it.
Should we wait for the criteria before collecting data?
The criteria will reward the highest performance classes. Data you do not have when the tender opens cannot be improved during the tender.
Łukasz Głuch
Builds DPPera, a digital product passport tool for small and medium-sized companies. Reads the delegated acts so you do not have to. Writes about what he checked in the registry, not about what vendors promise.
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