In Germany, 18.8 million tonnes of packaging waste were generated in 2020.
Source: monticellllo / Fotolia.com
The EU member states are currently discussing a proposal for new regulations on packaging and packaging waste. Six new UBA fact sheets support the discussion with facts and figures, experience from regulatory implementation in Germany, and background information relevant to the proposed new regulations.
The European Commission has published a Proposal for a Regulation on packaging and packaging waste (EU Packaging Regulation) at the end of 2022. The new regulation is intended to replace the previous Packaging and Packaging Waste Directive and thus aims to bring EU-wide harmonization of packaging and packaging waste regulations in many areas.
UBA welcomes the Commission's proposal in principle, as the propopsal contains good approaches to reducing the environmental impact of packaging and packaging waste over its entire life cycle. The German Environment Agency supports this, because packaging causes considerable resource consumption while having a very short use phase. In some areas, however, the proposal falls short of the requirements of the German Packaging Act (Verpackungsgesetz - Gesetz über das Inverkehrbringen, die Rücknahme und die hochwertige Verwertung von Verpackungen) which are already in force in Germany or is not ambitious enough from an environmental point of view. UBA is therefore committed to support that the Proposal of the EU Packaging Regulation will be adapted at European level. Six Fact sheets have now been published to support these proposals, providing important facts and figures, experience with official implementation and background information on different topics. The Fact Sheets are aimed particularly at stakeholders at the European level, but may also contain valuable information for other stakeholders.
The fact sheets cover the following areas:
So far, it is planned to base the EU Packaging Regulation on Article 114 TFEU on the internal market. In particular, in areas where national specifics or higher environmental requirements apply in Germany than stipulated in the Proposal of the EU Packaging Regulation, national achievements must be allowed to be maintained permanently. UBA therefore strongly recommends that the EU Packaging Regulation should be based on Article 192 TFEU on environmental protection as an additional legal basis.
The UBA’s motto, For our environment (“Für Mensch und Umwelt”), sums up our mission pretty well, we feel. In this video we give an insight into our work.
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