Brussels, 19/03/2013 (Agence Europe) - While some member states manage to put municipal waste to productive use, recycling or composting around 60% of their municipal waste, others struggle to manage it (see EUROPE 10798), which is why the European Commission plans to assist them, as sustainable management of waste is a necessity. This was precisely the aim of the high level conference organised in Brussels on Tuesday 19 March by the Commission in cooperation with the European Environment Agency (EEA), with a view to helping Bulgaria, the Czech Republic, Estonia, Greece, Italy, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Romania and Slovakia to optimise their waste management policies, through personalised roadmaps containing practical recommendations geared towards more effective implementation of EU legislation. The same day, the EEA published an in-depth analysis of the past decade's achievements in municipal waste management policies in the EU. It shows that, despite a rise in the recycling rates in some countries (on the whole, 35% of municipal waste was recycled in Europe in 2010 compared to 23% in 2001), Europe continues to waste huge volumes of precious resources by placing waste in landfills. Many countries will find it difficult to attain the recycling objectives imposed on them by EU legislation (50% of household waste and similar waste by 2020). Austria, Germany and Belgium are the countries that recycled the largest proportion of their municipal waste in 2010.
“Many member states still rely too heavily on landfilling and this is not in line with our efforts to achieve a more resource efficient Europe. (…) In the present economic circumstances, we need to find ways to improve waste management and use it as a trigger to create employment while easing the pressure on natural resources”, said Janez Potocnik, European Environment Commissioner.
The roadmaps emphasis the need to use economic instruments to improve municipal waste management, such as landfill and incineration taxes and bans, producer responsibility schemes and incentives to promote waste prevention, re-use and recycling. They recommend improving monitoring and statistics, intensifying separate collection, better governance, updating waste management strategies, and measures to increase public participation. They also underline that future investment in waste management should prioritise prevention, re-use, recycling and composting, in line with the hierarchy established by the EU legislation for waste treatment options. Similar seminars will be held in other member states to allow analysis of national waste management plans. Waste prevention programmes to be finalised in those countries are to be submitted to the Commission by December 2013. Review of the legally binding objectives fixed by EU legislation is underway and should be completed by end 2014. (AN/transl.jl)