The European Parliament on Wednesday approved a new law banning single-use plastic items such as plates, cutlery, straws and cotton buds sticks. Products that are easily and cheaply replaceable will be banned in the EU by 2021.
560 MEPs voted in favour of the agreement with EU ministers, 35 against and 28 abstained. The following products will be banned in the EU by 2021:
Single-use plastic cutlery (forks, knives, spoons and chopsticks)
Single-use plastic plates
Plastic straws
Cotton bud sticks made of plastic
Plastic balloon sticks
Oxo-degradable plastics and food containers and expanded polystyrene cups.
New recycling target and more responsibility for producers
Member states will have to achieve a 90% collection target for plastic bottles by 2029, and plastic bottles will have to contain at least 25% of recycled content by 2025 and 30% by 2030.
The agreement also strengthens the application of the polluter pays principle, in particular for tobacco, by introducing extended responsibility for producers. This new regime will also apply to fishing gear, to ensure that manufacturers, and not fishermen, bear the costs of collecting nets lost at sea, the EP said in a statement.
The legislation finally stipulates that labelling on the negative environmental impact of throwing cigarettes with plastic filters in the street should be mandatory, as well as for other products such as plastic cups, wet wipes and sanitary napkins.
This legislation will reduce the environmental damage bill by EUR 22 billion - the estimated cost of plastic pollution in Europe until 2030
, said lead MEP Frédérique Ries (ALDE, BE).
“Europe now has a legislative model to defend and promote at international level, given the global nature of the issue of marine pollution involving plastics. This is essential for the planet."
Background
According to the European Commission, more than 80% of marine litter is plastics. The products covered by this new law constitute 70% of all marine litter items.
Due to its slow rate of decomposition, plastic accumulates in seas, oceans and on beaches in the EU and worldwide. Plastic residue is found in marine species - such as sea turtles, seals, whales and birds, but also in fish and shellfish, and therefore in the human food chain.
One cigarette butt can pollute between 500 and 1000 litres of water, and thrown on the roadway, it can take up to twelve years to disintegrate. They are the second most littered single-use plastic items.
The changes the proposal would bring
The proposal would introduce a series of measures regarding the top 10 single-use plastics found on European beaches as well as fishing gear, with a view to reducing their impact on the environment and ensuring a functional internal market.
The proposed measures can be summarised as follows:
market restriction: banning certain items for which affordable alternatives exist: plastic cotton bud sticks, cutlery, plates, straws, drink stirrers and sticks for balloons;
consumption reduction: requiring Member States to achieve a ‘significant reduction’ in the consumption of food containers and drinks cups, for instance by setting national targets, making alternative products available to consumers, or ensuring that single-use plastic products cannot be provided free of charge;
separate collection: requiring Member States to ensure that by 2025, 90 % of single-use plastic drinks bottles are collected, for example through deposit refund schemes;
product design: requiring single-use plastics drinks containers and bottles to have their caps and lids attached;
extended producer responsibility: requiring Member States to ensure that extended producer responsibility schemes are established for a number of single-use plastic items (food containers, packets and wrappers, drinks containers and cups, cigarette filters, wet wipes, balloons and lightweight plastic bags) as well as fishing gear. For single-use plastics items, producers would cover the costs of waste management and clean-up, as well as awareness raising measures; for fishing gear, producers would cover the costs of waste management of gear delivered to port reception facilities;
labelling: requiring certain items (sanitary towels, wet wipes and balloons) to bear a label indicating how items should be disposed of, the negative environmental impact of inappropriate disposal, and the presence of plastics in the product;
awareness raising: requiring Member States to raise consumers’ awareness about available re-use systems and waste management options as well as about the negative impacts of inappropriate disposal. These measures would apply to food containers, drinks cups, drinks containers, balloons, packets and wrappers, cigarette filters, wet wipes and sanitary towels, lightweight plastic carrier bags, and fishing gear.
Impact assessment
In the impact assessment accompanying the proposal, the Commission estimates the following costs and benefits of the preferred option (which is not identical to the proposal, as indicated above):
for single-use plastics, by 2030:
costs: decrease in producer turnover (€3.2 billion); information campaign costs (€0.6 billion); business compliance, commercial washing and refill schemes costs (€1.4 billion); waste management costs (€0.5 billion);
benefits: decrease in top 10 single-use plastics marine litter by count (-56 %) and by weight (-35 %); decrease in greenhouse gas emissions (-2.63 million tonnes); reduction in external costs (-€11.1 billion); savings for consumers (€6.5 billion); additional jobs (4 000 full-time equivalents).
For fishing gear:
costs: set-up costs for extended producer responsibility schemes (€6.3 million); annual administrative and waste management costs for extended responsibility schemes (€11 million);
benefits: decrease by 2 600 tonnes each year in the amount of fishing gear left at sea, which would generate between €2 million and €7 million in economic benefits for fishing, port and tourism industries.
