Western preponderance? European countries score best in packaging material recycling

12 Jun 2024 --- Austria is the world’s best country for recycling, according to a new study by Reloop and Eunomia Research and Consulting. Wales, Taiwan, Germany and Belgium are next in the top five of the 48 countries ranked by the research.

The report examined the recycling performance of countries that report the highest recycling rates among many of the world’s largest economies. The study also includes lower-income countries in Latin America, Asia and Africa to highlight global disparities in national income and economic circularity. 

Joe Papineschi, chairperson at Eunomia Research and Consulting says: “It is very important to understand how each country around the world is performing in terms of waste generation and recycling of the generated waste so that we can accurately track the progress on moving toward a more circular world economy.”

“This Eunomia initiative will enable us to do that, with 48 countries already included in this phase and more countries to be added in the subsequent phases.”

Across the countries selected, Eunomia identified vast differences in real municipal recycling performance and in how data is collected. 

A few countries saw recycling rate adjustments increase their performance, with China and South Africa being the biggest beneficiaries.There are also examples of countries that are “relatively poor performers” on municipal waste in general, which have nonetheless achieved “very good results” for particular material streams. This evidences the impact that effective policies can have regardless of where they are implemented.

The countries with the biggest drops in their reported recycling rates were: Singapore, South Korea, Spain and Germany. Conversely, a few countries saw adjustments increase their performance, or compensate for the fact that they were not reporting recycling rates — China and South Africa being the biggest beneficiaries.

The impact of European waste policy
Tomra, the Welsh Government, the International Aluminium Institute and the Can Manufacturers Institute in collaboration with Reloop funded the research.

Eunomia defines municipal waste as household waste and waste from other sources that are similar in nature and composition to household waste.

A country’s performance was analyzed from their officially reported recycling rate — whenever available — and underlying waste data and other published sources to adjust the results.

Countries’ reported recycling rates were adjusted according to the following criteria:

• Removal of construction and demolition waste from both the total reported municipal solid waste and from dry recycling reported tonnages.
• Application of sorting losses to the tonnages reported for dry recycling and for organics recycling, where it appears that these have not been fully accounted for in the published recycling rate.

This list features a preponderance of Western and Central European countries, reflecting the effect of separate recycling collection systems and the impact of European waste policy, which has stimulated the development of infrastructure for logistics, sorting and treatment, highlights Eunomia. 

How to count in the informal waste sector?
Some of the lower-income countries do not report an official recycling rate. Eunomia explains that many of these countries do not have a wide-enough coverage of formal waste collections. Here, waste pickers carry out waste collection and sorting, while lacking regulation. 

“The circumstances for waste works in these situations can be hazardous in terms of health and safety and can also be exploitative from a social and economic perspective,” addresses Eunomia. Across countries, waste pickers carry out collection and sorting, while lacking regulation. 

But the situation regarding waste pickers and waste management outside the fully formal economy is “complex” and varies between regions and countries, making generalizations challenging.

In Colombia, for instance, the line between informal and formal is blurred. Waste pickers are paid and a decree in 2016 made “informal” recycling an official part of the solid waste management system. 

With increasing focus on a fair transition for waste pickers, as waste management systems improve in lower-income counties, Eunomia predicts that the situation is likely to change considerably in the coming years.

Poor data challenges
One common factor in countries with a significant part of waste management occurring outside the fully formal economy is that of poor data quality that lacks completeness and accuracy. “This is unsurprising, as most high-quality waste data relied on waste being weighed and data reported at different stages of the waste management process,” says Eunomia. 

“Even in countries where there is no formally reported recycling rate, our research found widespread evidence of recycling activity and so a focus only on reported recycling rates leads to achievements in these countries not being properly recognized,” it highlights. 

“Where possible, we have drawn on other data sources to create as complete a picture as possible. Nevertheless, many of the countries showing low recycling performance have little reliable data available; that which can be found is often outdated or based on limited surveys, making it difficult to estimate their performance with confidence.”

Plastic packaging recycling
Regarding plastic packaging waste, Ireland is the biggest producer of plastic packaging waste per capita at 74 kg per capita annually, while the average generation is 33 kg per capita annually across the countries that reported plastic packaging data. 

Taiwan is the leading country in terms of reported plastic packaging recycling, with a 97% recycling rate, while Timor-Leste and the US have the lowest reported recycling rates at 0.06% and 2.41%, respectively. 

The average plastic packaging recycling rate for the countries included in the study is 33%, remaining well under the EU-wide target of 55% by 2025. None of the EU countries included in this study seem to have reached this target level yet.

By Natalie Schwertheim