The European PET industry is urging policymakers not to impose targets for reducing consumption of PET trays and other PET food containers. This, the PET value chain says, will destroy the sector’s ongoing commitment and initiatives to support the resin’s circularity. Instead, the sector is calling on EU policymakers to set specific targets to enforce the separate collection and recycling of PET trays.

The European Parliament is currently assessing plans to tackle single-use plastics as part of its "Plastics Strategy" announced in January 2018 – see Plasteurope.com of 19.01.2018. The proposal envisages reducing consumption of PET trays, but industry associations PET Sheet Europe, Petcore Europe (Brussels / Belgium; https://petcore-europe.org/) and Plastics Recyclers Europe (PRE, Brussels; www.plasticsrecyclers.eu) say this goes entirely against the developments in recent years during which PET sheet manufacturers have been steadily increasing the amount of recyclates in their products.

PET Sheet Europe, a sector group within European Plastics Converters (EuPC, Brussels; www.eupc.org), says its members already use an average of 45% recycled material. Nevertheless, it believes increasing the collection rate is of “utmost importance,” but notes that separate collection of trays and other PET sheet-based products such as cups and lids is currently hampered by non-binding targets.

The association has made a commitment to the European Commission that it will raise the average recycled content of its products to 70% by 2025.