ESA to host meeting to look at deteriorating market for recyclable materials

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A high level meeting is being held today by the Environmental Services Association (ESA) to discuss the challenges in the UK recyclate market.

With prices having fallen recently for many materials, the ESA is bringing together a number of stakeholders across the supply chain to discuss the issue.

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ESA recycling policy advisor Jakob Rindegren said: “ESA is very concerned about recent downward trends in the UK’s recyclate markets, which are putting many waste and resource management companies, reprocessors and local authorities under severe pressure.

“While some of the causes, such as the drop in oil price and the fall in newspaper readership, are clearly difficult to tackle, we want to bring together stakeholders from across the whole of the supply chain to discuss what can be done, both immediately and in the longer term.

“In our view, everyone needs to work more closely with each other to ensure that all recyclable waste we collect also has a viable end market. This is absolutely critical if we want to treat waste as a resource, which is clearly important for creating a sustainable domestic resource industry, maximising value for local authority recycling services and meeting our recycling targets.

“We want to send a strong message to the incoming Government that they have to take this issue seriously, show leadership and adopt meaningful measures to repair the UK’s recycling markets.”