Waste issues are a top priority for the EEB. Our planet faces serious problems of increased consumption and generation of waste. As GDP rates increase, they in turn have an impact on resource depletion, as well as posing serious health risks. The overall quantity of waste is increasing faster than GDP. Each year in the European Union alone we throw away 1.3 billion tonnes of waste - some 40 million tonnes of it hazardous. This amounts to about 3.5 tonnes of solid waste for every man, woman and child, according to European Environment Agency statistics. Waste generation in the EU is still on the increase. By 2020, the OECD estimates, we could be generating 45% more waste than we did in 1995.
Land use, air pollution by the release of hazardous substances, and pollution of water and soils from disposal and recovery remain high. There is a current trend for shifting the problems from landfill disposal to incineration with energy recovery.
Despite of decades of harmonisation efforts, there is scarcely any environmental policy field where national differences in waste policy could be greater, than in the waste sector. This is due to strong cultural differences on how to deal with waste. Waste issues are strongly associated with everyday practices, with consumption behaviour and life-styles.
The EEB is committed to following-up and commenting both on the ongoing legislative work of the Commission, notably the revision of a number of existing measures, with the aim of introducing ambitious environmental goals in a defined timeframe. Particularly, the EEB believes that Individual Producer Responsibility is a powerful tool for achieving the objectives set by the 6th Environmental Action Programme.
Individual Producer Responsibility is a key tool for product innovation. It is part of the strategy to decrease the total environmental impact of a product, by making the manufacturer of the product responsible for the entire life cycle of the product, and especially for the take-back, recycling and final disposal of the product. This creates incentives upstream for ecological product design, improves corporate credibility and reputation, enhances business development opportunities and facilitates dialogue and partnership with key stakeholders.
The EEB strongly recommends that Individual Producer Responsibility be applied when developing further legislation on waste (tyres, construction and demolition, and batteries), and when revising the existing legislation, as required by the 6th EAP.
The EU has an important role to play in future waste policies. The internal market contains a mechanism (strengthened in the Amsterdam Treaty) to bring national issues quickly to the European Agenda. Any national measure which might be a barrier to trade must be notified to the Commission, which may adopt European measures. This mechanism - if strategically used by Member States and tolerated by the European Commission - may make the EU a unique supranational organisation of environmental policy innovation.
The EU should diffuse as soon as possible national innovations for waste prevention (ecological tax reform, producer responsibility, ecological product policy; chemicals control policy; strict requirements for collection, recycling and treatment and safe final depositing and information instruments) in order to reconcile ecological and internal market objectives in the long run.
To strengthen the use of this mechanism more frequently two conditions must be met. Member States should use the opportunity for national leadership in waste prevention policy more systematically and the Commission should not be too restrictive in containing such initiatives by giving the internal market objective superiority over environmental objectives. National leadership might create problems with the internal market in the short run - but in the long run it is the only way to achieve a high level of environmental protection (e.g. by prevention) and an internal market without discrimination and barriers.
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