Webinar: Recycled Polyester Testing & Verification
December 9, 2021
2:00 PM ET to 3:00 PM ET | Online

Audience:

Open industry. All apparel and footwear industry professionals, regardless of AAFA membership, are encouraged to participate.

Description:

With conscious consumerism on the rise, many companies are using environmental claims on their apparel and footwear articles. Lack of consistency in the language can make it difficult to differentiate between products that are genuinely environmentally friendly and those that aren’t. This is increasingly true for recycled content claims in a market where importers and brands want to create higher value-added articles for environmentally conscious individuals. Join this webinar to consider how to properly substantiate these recycled content claims. 

Attendees of this webinar will learn:
  • Regulatory trends related to recycled content.
  • Updates around the circular economy and sustainability.
  • The latest on recycled content verification and testing.

Speakers:
Sandeep Khatua
Global Technical Director

TÜV SÜD 
Sandeep is a Product Safety and Business Development Executive in the Consumer Goods Industry. Currently, he is a Global Technical Director with 
TÜV SÜD where he provides technical leadership to the entire soft lines and hardlines business dealing with North American customers. Sandeep brings 20 plus years of experience leading technical systems improvements, product, and business development activities within diverse industries such as apparel, home goods, footwear, and accessories. 

Dr. Max Rehberger
Business Development Manager for Global Product Sustainability Services
TÜV SÜD

As a business development manager for global product sustainability services, Max drives the global services portfolio with a focus on enabling a trustful circular economy. He is an industrial engineer with a background in systems development and sustainability assessment of emerging technologies and holds a PhD in the field of assessing resource efficient manufacturing models.

R. Mahalakshmi 
General Manager 

TÜV SÜD 
Mahalakshmi is a general manager and technical head for South Asia in TÜV SÜD. She has 25 years of vast experience in technical and operational activities of chemical, mechanical and restricted substances in non-food labs. Mahalakshmi is a lead and technical assessor auditing 100 labs as per ISO/IEC 17025 and a technical trainer for the industry infield of restricted substances and ZDHC.

Moderator:
Nate Herman
Senior Vice President, Policy
AAFA

Nate Herman oversees AAFA’s Policy department, managing the association’s lobbying, policy, and regulatory affairs activities. Nate leads AAFA’s corporate social responsibility (CSR) program, formulating and implementing CSR policy and representing AAFA and the industry on CSR issues before governments, NGOs, and other key stakeholders. In addition, Nate develops all apparel and footwear industry data and statistics as AAFA's resident economist. Prior to joining AAFA, Nate worked for six years at the U.S. Department of Commerce's International Trade Administration assisting U.S. firms in entering the global market. Nate spent the last two years as the Department's industry analyst for the footwear and travel goods industries. Nate received a Masters of Public and International Affairs from the University of Pittsburgh in 1994 and a Bachelor of Arts in International Relations and Economics from the University of Delaware in 1992.