The European Federation of Waste Management and Environmental Services (FEAD) has launched its Driving the Circular Economy strategy.
For the period 2014 to 2020, the FEAD strategy reflects the role that Europe’s waste and resource management industry will take in developing a more circular economy, and help to deliver Europe’s economic and environmental objectives.
FEAD president and SITA UK chief executive David Palmer-Jones (pictured) said: “The strategy which FEAD is publishing today sets out our vision of how the resource management industry can play its full part in achieving a more sustainable, prosperous and resilient European economy.
“The first overarching theme running through our strategy is partnership working with designers, manufacturers and retailers. Joining up the start of the product cycle with its end point is the goal of the circular economy, and none of this can happen without partnership.
“The second key theme is coherence in policy making. We believe it is the duty of policy makers at all levels to assist the development of a more circular economy in Europe, which will create jobs and growth while improving resource security and protecting the environment.
“In this context, FEAD welcomes the European Commission’s proposals to revise EU waste legislation and targets, which set out an ambitious long-term vision for Europe’s resources policy beyond 2020. We look forward to working with the EU institutions on the practical steps needed to turn these ambitious targets into reality.”
Among the measures in the strategy, FEAD wants the market for recovered materials to be stimulated through:
- Stronger rules on green public procurement at European level to promote the use of products with recycled content
- Transparency in extended producer responsibility schemes to encourage manufacturers to use recycled materials and to ensure fair and equal access to materials and resources
- The European Commission exploring the possibility of applying a lower rate of VAT to second hand goods and green products, to promote waste prevention and reuse
- Eco-labelling rules to enable consumers to choose recycled products.
FEAD also called for an opening up of competition to allow private sector companies to compete with public sector monopolies for household waste collections where they operate.
It also wants a world market for materials so that those that cannot be recycled in Europe are exported for recovery, provided it is done in an environmentally sound manner.
The strategy also suggests that the European Commission should improve the statistics on raw material and waste flows.
View the full strategy at www.fead.be
