EU, 83.4 million tonnes of packaging. Plastic grows

Encouraging numbers for Italy, as pointed out by Conai. "The 2023 results," emphasises director Simona Fontana, "exceed the EU targets envisaged for 2030 despite a difficult general context for Italian companies.

In detail, 428,000 tonnes of steel, 59,000 tonnes of aluminium, 4,674,000 tonnes of paper, 2,164,000 tonnes of wood, 1,55,000 tonnes of traditional plastic and about 44,000 tonnes of compostable bioplastic, and 2,46,000 tonnes of glass were recycled.

And if one adds to the recycling figures those of energy recovery, i.e. the use of packaging waste as an alternative fuel to produce energy, the total amount of packaging recovered comes to 11.804 million tonnes, i.e. 85% of the packs released for consumption.

In 2023, 7,242 municipalities signed at least one agreement with the consortium system, with 96% of the population served. And over 15 million inhabitants of Central and Southern Italy are involved in special territorial projects aimed at increasing recycling collections in areas still lagging behind.

In order to cover the costs of taking back packaging waste in a differentiated way, in 2023 Conai paid 696 million euros to Italian municipalities: resources that come from the companies producing and using packaging that bear the costs of managing its end-of-life. The 2023 recycling results allow Italy to remain in a solid position within the European framework.

"The overall recycling targets required by the Union for 2030, when each state will have to recycle at least 70% of its packaging waste, are by now largely exceeded," the director emphasises. According to the latest Eurostat data, Italy is the leader for per capita recycling of packaging in a head-to-head competition with Germany, trailing the smaller and more manageable Luxembourg by several points. It is no coincidence that last year the European Commission included our country among the nine not at risk for reaching the recycling targets, in its advance warning report on the implementation of the Waste Directives".

Last March, meanwhile, a provisional agreement was reached to make packaging more sustainable and reduce its waste in the European Union. The proposal, as outlined in March, "takes into account the entire life cycle of packaging. It sets requirements to ensure that packaging is safe and sustainable, requiring that all packaging be recyclable and that the presence of substances of concern be minimised'. The agreement is provisional pending formal adoption by both institutions.

The text of the provisional agreement maintains most of the sustainability requirements for all packaging placed on the market and the main targets proposed by the Commission.

"It strengthens the requirements for substances in packaging by introducing a restriction on the placing on the market of food contact packaging containing perfluoroalkyl substances (Pfas) above certain thresholds. To avoid overlaps with other legislation, the co-legislators instructed the Commission to assess the need to amend this restriction within four years from the date of application of the regulation".

The provisional agreement maintains the main targets for 2030 and 2040 for the minimum recycled content in plastic packaging. The co-legislators agreed to exempt compostable plastic packaging and packaging whose plastic component represents less than 5% of the total weight of the packaging from these targets. The Commission will have to review the implementation of the 2030 targets and assess the feasibility of the 2040 targets. The agreement also invites the Commission to assess, three years after the entry into force of the regulation, the state of technological development of bio-based plastic packaging and, based on this assessment, to set sustainability requirements for bio-based content in plastic packaging.

The new rules would reduce unnecessary packaging by setting the maximum proportion of empty space in multi-packaging, transport and e-commerce to 50 per cent, and by requiring manufacturers and importers to ensure that the weight and volume of packaging is kept to a minimum, with the exception of protected packaging models (provided that such protection is already applicable on the date of entry into force of the regulation).

*This article is part of the Pulse project and was written by Davide Madeddu (Il Sole 24 Ore, Italy) with the contribution of HVG (Hungary).