“Tip of the plastic waste iceberg”: Hidden UK trash exports 18 times higher than estimated, finds IPEN

17 Mar 2023 --- Current reporting systems for plastic waste traded globally underestimate the volumes, missing as much as 1.8 million metric tons of two types of hidden plastic waste – from textiles and plastics in waste paper bales – finds research.

An independent team of researchers from the International Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN), Sweden, The Last Beach Cleanup, US, Cukurova University, Turkey and the Department of Biological and Environmental Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, have published a study exposing hidden toxic plastic waste trade.

The report highlights gaps in the current system for tracking the trade of plastic wastes, finding that when hidden plastics wastes are counted, exports to non-OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries could be more than double.

High-income countries generate about 34% of the world’s waste, frequently exporting plastic waste to countries that lack the infrastructure to handle these and their wastes in an environmentally friendly manner.

On being asked how waste colonialism could be tackled, co-author of the report Therese Karlsson, science and technical advisor at IPEN, tells PackagingInsights that one “key step” is that high-income countries must stop sending their wastes to low- and middle-income countries.

“Overall, there is a need for a higher level of traceability and transparency of both materials and chemicals. Plastic production needs to decrease and countries that are major producers of plastic waste must take responsibility for their plastic waste and stop exporting it to other countries,” shares Karlsson.The report highlights gaps in the current system for tracking the trade of plastic waste.

“Guise of recycling”
The report finds that with hidden plastics counted, the amount of waste exported from the UK would increase 18 times, while exports from the EU would be 2.2 times higher and from the US, 4.2 times higher.

UN Comtrade database tracks products via Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System (HS), which assigns each product category a code. The authors detail that when the plastic waste trade is analyzed, the analysis is often limited to the category HS 3915, which correlates to “Waste, parings, and scrap, of plastics.”  

“This category only captures a subset of the total plastic waste trade. Because the HS system is not designed to identify different types of materials but is more focused on product types, HS 3915 fails to include plastic wastes that may be coded in several other product categories,” the authors write.  

“The result is that materials coded as HS 3915 reflect only the tip of the plastic waste iceberg and do not tell the whole story.”

The study found that after adjusting for hidden plastic wastes, the EU or US would be the largest exporter (depending on the range of estimates used) instead of Japan, which by the current tracking system, is the largest exporter of plastic waste.

Historically, the report says, high-income countries have exported a “significant amount of plastic waste under the guise of recycling,” but due to flaws of the current reporting system – for instance, synthetic textiles and plastic contamination in mixed paper bales – are not included in the HS 3915 estimation.

“There are also other categories of hidden plastics missed by current estimates: as much as 20% of electronic wastes are exported, and e-waste contains about 20% plastic, while less than 20% of e-waste is recycled,” summarizes IPEN.

“Rubber wastes, including the large category of used auto tires, are not included under the plastic waste trade code. The industry also hides plastic waste as refuse-derived fuels, which are simply waste plastics that are re-purposed and exported.” Current reporting systems for plastic waste traded globally underestimate the volumes by over 1.8 million metric tons.

Unequal waste exchange
According to the researchers, trends over the last decades show that the amounts of plastic wastes are increasing. It is estimated that global production of plastic waste will reach 26 billion metric tons by 2050.

Between 2004 and 2021, the report states that the EU’s exports of wastes to non-EU countries (mainly Turkey, India and Egypt) increased by 77%.

“Without global policies to reduce plastics production, there will continue to be an unequal exchange of plastic wastes from high-income countries to non-high-income countries. To develop sustainable waste management practices for the future, the production of plastics needs to decrease, and plastics should only be used when they are essential for the functioning of society,” the authors underscore.

Karlsson adds: “Our report demonstrates that we do not really know enough about how much plastic wastes are actually exported.”

“Plastic wastes contain toxic chemicals that contaminate the environment and threaten human health where they are dumped or burned. We need to significantly reduce plastics production or risk ongoing unequal and harmful plastic exports that endanger lives across the globe.”

By Radhika Sikaria