NEWS
EuPC: Plastic packaging waste tax will not help recycling rates
European plastics industry groups have reacted strongly after the EU Council of Ministers approved a plan in July to tax unrecycled plastic packaging waste. The Council reached agreement on a new Multiannual Financial Frame- work to aid economic recovery from the Covid-19 pandemic, containing the proposed tax among other measures. The plan involves a €0.80/kg levy on non-recycled plastic packaging waste which would be paid by member states into the EU budget. It would take effect from 1 January 2021. The European Plastics Converters (EuPC) industry body criticised the basis of the tax, presented by the European Commission as “contribution
to the EU budget designed to incentiv- ise member states to increase recy- cling from plastic waste”, and warned that it might have the opposite effect. EuPC Managing Director Alexandre Dangis said: “As the revenues of the EU plastic tax are not earmarked to be invested into the waste and recycling infrastructure, it will not increase the recycling of plastic waste in Europe. Instead, it will further increase the cost of plastic recycling and encourage the shift to other packaging materials with a bigger environmental impact. To truly increase recycling rates across Europe and protect the environment, taxation of the landfilling of plastic packaging waste would be more efficient.”
GKV, the German plastics proces- sors association, agreed that an EU land tax would be better. “The EU plastic tax is withdrawing from the member states who do not yet have a good recycling infrastructure, valuable investment funds,” said Oliver Möllen- städt, General Manager. GKV added the levy is “disproportionate”. Martin Engelmann, General Man-
ager of the IK plastic packaging group in Germany warned of unwanted side effects. Talk of a plastic packaging tax in Italy has already led to a switch from plastics to plastic-paper composites which is more difficult to recycle than plastics packaging, he said. �
www.plasticsconverters.eu �
www.gkv.de
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