The draft regulation on packaging waste stokes fears about impact on forests

Faced with an increase in the amount of waste produced, the European Commission wants to introduce regulations to reduce the quantity of packaging and make it more sustainable, but environmental groups warn pressure is being put on forests to produce more paper, which some see as a more sustainable option.

Across the world, three billion trees are cut down every year to meet the demand for paper packaging, according to environmental groups, and the pressure on forests keeps increasing as consumption goes up.

According to the European Commission, the total mass of packaging waste generated in the EU rose by 20% in the ten years leading up to 2020, with paper and cardboard representing 41%.

“Packaging production is set to increase by 19% between now and 2030 if nothing is done,” warned Hannah Mowat, campaign coordinator at Fern, a non-profit group dedicated to protecting forests.

But that could be about to change with the EU’s Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR), tabled in November last year.

For the first time, the new regulation introduces targets at the EU level for waste prevention and reuse, as well as for product recyclability, said Mattia Pellegrini, head of the unit on waste and resources at the European Commission’s environment directorate, who spoke at a Euractiv event on 14 November.

The aim, he said, is to stop the constant increase in the volume of discarded packaging, which amounts to around 180kg per person per year. By 2024, the official emphasised that all EU countries will need to have producer responsibility schemes in place for all types of packaging and targets for waste reduction and reuse.

Still, environmentalists say this may not be enough.

“Packaging waste is growing much faster than the GDP of member states,” noted Marco Musso from the European Environmental Bureau, a federation of green NGOs. Moreover, rules set out in the EU’s previous packaging law were “too vague” and have had “no practical effect on limiting the growth of packaging waste,” he pointed out, saying more radical measures were needed to stop rising demand for packaging.

For environmental groups like Fern, the urgency is clear.

Across the EU, 15-20% of all trees harvested are used directly for packaging, Mowat said. And the over-consumption of packaging does not only affect Europe, she added, saying Brazil has now become the EU’s biggest supplier of paper pulp while in Indonesia, the exploitation of tropical forest for European consumers has increased by 250% over the last ten years.

Paper industry places emphasis on recycling

Faced with growing pressure from environmental groups, the paper industry emphasises that paper is a renewable material and draws attention to its track record regarding recycling.

Paper and board has the highest recycling rate of all packaging types – at 82.5%, said Ulrich Leberle, director of raw materials at the Confederation of European Paper Industries (CEPI).

The priority, he says, is to build a circular economy to move away from petroleum-based materials like plastic and keep “fossil fuels in the ground”.

According to CEPI, 70% of paper packaging is now being produced via recycling, and the industry is aiming to increase this to 90% by 2030. But achieving higher recyling rates will require improving waste collection systems, and making it easier to separate paper from other packaging materials, he points out.

Environmentalists, for their part, come up with different statistics. According to Mowat, only 50% of paper-based packaging is actually being recycled – not 70%.

Whatever the real figures are, “the circular economy does not necessarily mean recycling,” the EEB’s Marco Musso remarked, saying “recycling alone does not reduce waste production”.

“As soon as we accept single-use paper packaging, we encourage people not to go any further and not to look for reuse or prevention solutions. We are encouraging the switch from single-use plastic packaging to single-use paper packaging,” Musso said.

Pellegrini acknowledged that point, saying the Commission’s objective is to boost reuse to reduce waste production. He said the EU’s PPWR’s proposal took inspiration from Germany by promoting greater standardisation in packaging to improve recyclability and putting in place an effective reuse system to reduce the volume of single-use packaging.

For environmental groups, though, there is a much bigger issue at stake – which is to combat climate change by allowing forests to grow and continue absorbing carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas responsible for the planet’s heating.

“The fight against fossil fuel emissions is pointless if we do not combat the massive decline in forest carbon sinks,” Mowat said.

> Watch the full recording of the Euractiv event below:

This article follows the Euractiv-organised policy debate “Analysing the Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation – What are the implications for our forests?” supported by Life Terra.

[Edited by Frédéric Simon/Alice Taylor]

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