Resource-effi­cient cir­cu­lar eco­nomy in the EU

European Bioplastics wel­comes the European Parliament’s adop­tion of the own-ini­ti­at­ive report of Finnish MEP Sirpa Pietikäin­en on ​‘resource effi­ciency: mov­ing towards a cir­cu­lar eco­nomy’. ​„The European Uni­on needs to use nat­ur­al resources more effi­ciently, and the European Parliament’s vote is a strong call for the European Com­mis­sion to pro­pose the neces­sary legis­la­tion by 2015“, says François de Bie, Chair­man of the Board of European Bioplastics. In its report, the EP deman­ded bind­ing waste-reduc­tion and recyc­ling tar­gets, a man­dat­ory sep­ar­ate col­lec­tion and recyc­ling of biowaste by 2020, to lim­it incin­er­a­tion to non-recyc­lable and non-bio­de­grad­able waste, to gradu­ally ban land­filling, as well as to apply resource-use indic­at­ors in sup­port of a 30% improve­ment of resource effi­ciency by 2030. The Com­mis­sion should also review the cur­rent eco-design legis­la­tion and oth­er rel­ev­ant product policy legis­la­tion by the end of 2016 with regards to broad­en­ing its scope by cov­er­ing all product groups and estab­lish­ing min­im­um recycled mater­i­al con­tent in new products. While call­ing for the imple­ment­a­tion of an ambi­tious recyc­ling tar­get of 80% of all pack­aging waste by 2030, the MEPs invited the Com­mis­sion to assess the feas­ib­il­ity of gradu­ally repla­cing food pack­aging with biobased and bio­de­grad­able, com­postable mater­i­als in accord­ance with European stand­ards. Addi­tion­ally, the Par­lia­ment deman­ded to apply the cas­cad­ing prin­ciple for the use of resources, not­ably bio­mass. Accord­ing to the report, these meas­ures could boost the EU’s gross domest­ic product by nearly one per­cent and cre­ate 2 mil­lion new jobs by 2030. ​“High-skilled jobs in bioplastic man­u­fac­tur­ing, con­vert­ing and actu­ally along the com­plete bioplastic value chain can be an import­ant part of this growth”, says François. Source: European Bioplastics e.V.