EU investigating further bans on plastic packaging, Commissioner reveals
13 Jan 2020 --- The EU Commission is considering further bans on plastic packaging and new requirements for manufacturers, Virginijus Sinkevičius, EU Commissioner-designate for Environment, Oceans and Fisheries, told German newspaper Die Welt in a recent interview. In May 2019, the Council of the EU officially adopted measures proposed by the European Commission to tackle marine litter by banning the 10 single-use products most commonly found on European beaches.
“We definitely want to expand the rules for single-use plastics and are currently investigating in which direction it would be possible,” Sinkevičius said. “An important step would be, for example, to ban plastic packaging or to prescribe the use of recycled plastic.”
“Microplastics are on our agenda. By the end of the year, we will provide a very detailed list of all those products that contain microplastics or that use microplastics,” Sinkevicius added.
The Single-Use Plastics Directive bans plastic products such as cotton buds, cutlery, plates, straws and stirrers and also incorporates abandoned fishing gear and oxo-degradable plastics. The EU Member States have until 2021 to transpose the legislation into national law.
According to BloombergNEF estimations, the EU ban on single-use plastics threatens a market exceeding US$10 billion. Polypropylene and polystyrene are the plastic types most endangered.
Last week, a Green Alliance report warned that plastics are only the tip of the single-use iceberg and pointed the finger at throwaway culture as the root cause of packaging’s environmental scourge. The research, based on anonymized interviews with leading UK supermarkets and brands, warns that in the absence of government direction, “a disjointed and potentially counterproductive approach to solving plastic pollution is emerging.” Most concerningly, the trend towards swapping out plastics for alternative materials may actually lead to higher carbon emissions and lower packaging recyclability, the report stresses.
Edited by Joshua Poole
