The packaging manufacturers’ organisation European Organization for Packaging and the Environment (Europen, Brussels / Belgium; www.europen-packaging.eu) has written a letter to EU Environment Commissioner Janez Potocnik relating to the forthcoming EU Waste Targets Review.

Virginia Janssens, Europen’s managing director, stated: “The Commission's forthcoming legislative proposal on EU waste targets is a key opportunity to transition towards a resource efficient and competitive Europe and to drive further recycling and recovery of packaging waste away from landfills. To this end, clarified roles and responsibilities for Extended Producer Responsibility (EPR) with binding minimum performance criteria for EPR compliance schemes in the Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive are crucial for industry who is obliged to implement EPR for packaging at national level.” Similar statements were previously made by European Plastics Converters (EuPC, Brussels; www.plasticsconverters.eu) – see Plasteurope.com of 30.01.2014.

Janssens continued: “Amid current market distortions and vague European and national laws on EPR for packaging waste, Europen calls upon the Commission for more legal clarity which will ensure a much needed and urgent level playing field and more transparency among the various national compliance scheme models, who are set up to transpose the legal obligation of the obliged industry."

Last month, Europen released its statistics for packaging and packaging waste for the period 1998-2011, which showed that 64% of material placed on the market was being recycled – see Plasteurope.com of 17.03.2014.