Business Europe wants EU circular economy legislation to have economic rather than environmental focus

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Europe’s proposed legislation on the circular economy should be withdrawn and re-tabled as economic rather than environmental policy, according to Business Europe.

It also called for a proposed target on resource efficiency to be scrapped. This target of measuring GDP relative to Raw Material Consumption (RMC) was proposed by former Environment Commissioner Janez Potočnik in July.   

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The organisation, which is a federation of European business organisations including the CBI in Britain, was offering its views in response to new European Commission Vice President Frans Timmermans’ (pictured) proposals to cut red tape.

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Business Europe set out its policy on the circular economy with particular reference to legislative proposals on waste, packaging and packaging waste, landfill of waste, end-of-life vehicles, (waste) batteries and accumulators, and waste electric and electronic equipment.

In the statement, it said: “Moving Europe towards a more circular economy model is important from an economic as well as environment perspective. This is the reason why the six legislative proposals that are part of the circular economy package should be approached as an economic piece of legislation rather than from a purely environmental perspective.

“The proposal should be withdrawn and re-table as an economic piece of legislation The circular economy dossier should take account of issues of wider economic interest (including manufacturing and product design, consumer affairs, research and innovation, security of supply and raw materials) as well as markets beside the environmental dimensions which includes recycling, reuse or landfilling.

“Business Europe also consistently raised concerns about the resource productivity headline target and the respective indicator (RMC/GDP). These should not be proposed or considered, and the whole package should be consistent with the EU growth and jobs agenda and the competitiveness programme.”