Page 34 - FoodFocusThailand No.229 April 2025

SPECIAL FOCUS

Rising demand for plastics, and the disposal
problems entailed, have led an ever-
increasing number of consumers, companies
and national governments to realise just how
important plastics recycling is. So now is the
perfect time to take a look at the future of
recycling worldwide.

Latest Regulation Updates

on Plastic Recycling

for Beverage Sustainability

As you will know, the use of recycled plastics offers many • The UN’s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee on
advantages: It reduces the amounts of CO emitted during Plastics Pollution has been tasked with developing an instrument
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production of plastic packaging and the dependence on fossil by the end of 2024, which is to be legally binding on an
resources, and it helps combat global littering. The bad news international scale and aimed at reducing plastic littering
is that there’s still plenty to do because according to Plastics worldwide.
Europe only just under 27 per cent of all plastic waste in But companies have also developed a heightened awareness
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Europe is at present recycled. The percentage for recycling for the need to recycle more material. To give you an example:
on a global scale is even smaller. The good news is that According to the Fraunhofer Institute, many firms have
numbers are rising, thanks not least to countless regulations implemented take-back programmes for their packaging to make
introduced by governments all over the world. A variety of sure it is definitely recycled. Some manufacturers of PET bottles
legal requirements have been (or are currently being) have voluntarily increased the target value for recycled content
approved in the EU, such as: and already produce bottles made of up to 100 percent rPET –
• The Plastic Tax enacted in 2021: That is a levy to be not least because consumer demand for them has grown.
paid by companies on non-recycled plastic packaging to the
amount of 0.80 euros per kilogram. The scheduled year of Waste isn’t rubbish!?
introduction in Germany is 2025. As a result of the ongoing progress in legislation and a steady
• Mandatory use of recycled material for plastic rise in demand from companies, the market for recycled plastics
packaging: PET beverage bottles, for example, must be is also growing. And technological advances are likewise driving
made of at least 25 per cent rPET as from 2025, and of at the recycling market. It is widely known that PET beverage bottles
least 30 percent rPET as from 2030. and their caps (made of polyolefin) can nowadays be recycled
• A mandatory deposit system for PET beverage without any problems, so the plastics recovered can be re-used.
bottles and beverage cans is scheduled to be introduced And this means, contrary to mainstream thinking, that PET bottles
in each EU country as part of the Packaging and Packaging are among the most sustainable types of packaging currently
Waste Regulation (PPWR) as from 2029. available! But it is meanwhile also possible to recycle other
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• Tethered caps make sure that a higher number of plastics: Systems that are able to recycle other types of
caps are kept in the cycle of re-usable materials when packaging, such as detergent containers made of HDPE, LDPE
non-returnable beverage bottles are recycled. films or yoghurt tubs made of polystyrene are already up and
running today. Whereas it used to be mainly bottling companies
International Actions Worldwide and big beverage brands that rigorously pursued PET recycling
• In the past few years, India, Thailand, and South Korea in order to achieve their sustainability targets, the disposal firms
have approved recycled plastics for food contact and themselves have now come to realise that plastic waste isn’t
formulated some ambitious goals. India, for example, has rubbish but a valuable source of raw materials with great inherent
specified a proportion of 10 per cent recycled materials in potential.
rigid plastic packaging as from 2025.
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• In the USA, some states like California are leading the
way with deposit systems and binding rPET quotas. 3
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