Brussels, 23/06/2016 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 23 June, a collective of German NGOs explained that if the transition to the circular economy proposed by the European Commission is to be successful, it will need the EU to respect the waste treatments hierarchy included in its legislation on waste. This legislation calls for prevention and re-use to be prioritised.
This alliance of NGOs consists of Deutsche Umwelthilfe and six other organisations active in the environment and economy. They believe that as long as this hierarchy is not translated into binding legislation to prevent waste, encourage reuse and protect resources, MEPs and European Ministers for the Environment, should not sign up to the Circular Economy package presented in July by the Commission and which the Environment Council gave it its full support in Luxembourg on 20 June (see EUROPE 11577).
According to this NGO collective, the Commission proposals do not provide any new incentives to help tackle the increasing mountain of waste and escalating use of resources. The NGOs emphasise that on the contrary, "the Circular Economy package is completely lacking measures to avoid waste". They also urged the Commission to draw up binding regulation to encourage reusable packaging systems, in addition to single use bottles and other drink packaging.
These NGOs are convinced that binding objectives are the best way of guaranteeing that efficient measures for preventing waste and encouraging reuse in the member states are really taken into account. They also call for an annual per capita maximum target to be set of 130 kg for residual waste by 2030 and a target of 90 kg for packaging waste.
The NGOs believe that the Commission's idea of a joint reuse and packaging and product recycling target "is seriously infringing the waste hierarchy" with regard to waste treatments (with prevention as a priority, then reuse, recycling, evaluation, incineration with energy recuperation and elimination) because the Commission is putting a priority on recycling, which only occupies third place in this hierarchy.
The European Parliament rapporteur for the revision of the six "Waste" directives, Simona Bonafè, believes it necessary to bolster waste prevention because the Commission has not made it enough of a priority and has also failed to propose binding targets. (see EUROPE 11573). (Original version in French by Aminata Niang)