On 17 December 2021, ENPC and 39 other European associations, sent a
joint proposal to establish an EU harmonized model for consumer sorting instructions as part of the “Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive revision” to the relevant EU Commission Directorates.
To boost a circular economy and achieve the EU packaging recycling targets by 2025/2030, the collection rates in the EU must increase. Alongside industry’s efforts to establish a better and more efficient collection, sorting and recycling infrastructure for post-consumer waste and to continuously improve packaging eco-design, it is essential to fully engage consumers to achieve this goal.
This can be done by improving the separate waste collection rate at consumer level, increasing consumers’ awareness about the need to sort and recycle, making sorting easy for consumers, and including them as relevant actors in the circular management of waste.
The broad endorsement of this collective proposal is a strong signal that the multitude of national packaging sorting instructions is not helping to improve consumer awareness nor recycling. The proposal indicates the principles needed to develop a clear and simple system, harmonized at EU level, which could leverage the most effective features of existing national schemes.