Brussels wants all EU packaging to be recyclable by 2030

How many packages do you have to open, and then throw away, every time you buy a product, from food in the supermarket to food at home or, above all, when we buy online?

Brussels has made its calculations: each year, each European generates almost 180 kilos of packaging waste.

That add up to almost 80 million tons between all of them.

And this highly avoidable garbage will increase to 215 kilos per person per year by 2030, if this trend is not stopped.

A little over a year ago, the ban on products such as single-use plastic straws, plates and cutlery came into effect.

Now, the European Commission wants to take a new step in its transition towards a circular economy with a proposal to drastically reduce excess packaging and promote reusable or refillable packaging options.

One of the main objectives defined this Wednesday is to ensure that all product packaging sold in the Twenty-seven is recyclable and, at the same time, "economically viable" by 2030 and that, by 2040, overall packaging waste is reduced by one 37%

"Today we are taking a further step by putting the entire packaging sector on the path towards circularity", the Vice-President of the Commission and responsible for the European Green Pact, Frans Timmermans, celebrated when presenting the proposal in Brussels.

It is as much about promoting recycling and the use of recycled materials in packaging as the reuse of containers, two concepts, reuse and recycling, which are not antagonistic but combinable and even complementary, said the Commissioner for the Environment, Virginijus Sinkevicius, for whom "a change is needed in the system".

Among the measures proposed by the European Executive is "promoting" the use of reusable or refillable containers in retail trade, which in the last two decades has suffered a vertiginous fall.

To do this, companies must offer, on a mandatory basis, a certain percentage of their products in reusable or refillable containers, for example takeaway drinks.

“By 2040, most takeaway coffees will have to be put in reusable cups or in cups that we bring,” Timmermans said in this regard.

The packaging must also be "easy to recycle" and be made with the highest possible percentage of recycled material.

In addition, certain types of containers will be prohibited, for example those for single use for food and beverages consumed inside restaurants or cafes, as well as plastic wrap for fruits and vegetables, or miniature containers for shampoos and other products in hotels. .

There will be mandatory percentages of recycled material that producers must include in new plastic packaging.

Brussels also wants to clarify the confusion that many consumers feel when it comes to throwing their waste in the different garbage cans that most countries stipulate. “We have all received products bought online and they arrive in boxes that are too big.

And we have often wondered how to separate the garbage for recycling, what to do with a biodegradable bag or if all the packaging we throw away is going to be used again or transformed at least into something new”, summarized Sinkevicius.

An initiative that will also create "new business opportunities in the green and digital transition", added Sinkevicius, as well as more jobs in the sector - more than 600,000 jobs by 2030 - and more money in the pocket of Europeans: the Commission calculates that if companies transfer the savings they will achieve with the reuse of packaging to the consumer, this could save up to 100 euros per year.

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