Campaign partner Greenpeace has published a new study about sportswear and chemicals. This is the first study that has specifically focused on football kits which are being sold for the World Cup taking place in Brazil in June this year.
This study follows on from several previous investigations published by Greenpeace as part of its Detox campaign, which identified that hazardous chemicals are present in textile and leather products as a result of their use during manufacture.
For the Greenpeace investigation, 33 products in total including boots, shirts, goalkeeper gloves, and a ball were bought from sixteen different countries/regions around the world and sent to the Greenpeace Research Laboratories at the University of Exeter (UK) with a duplicate sent to Greenpeace Germany.
After being dispatched to independent accredited laboratories, the football boots and gloves were investigated for the presence of perfluorinated chemicals (PFC). All the products were analysed for nonylphenol ethoxylates (NPE) and phthalates, and the football boots and ball were analysed for dimethylformamide (DMF). This is the first time that Greenpeace has investigated products for the presence of DMF.
The full report is available here
