The European Container Glass Industry fully supports the recently published Commission Circular Economy Roadmap and Action Plan

The glass packaging sector is committed to collaborate with the Commission to achieve its goals and objectives and we call for support to our industry in this effort.  An efficient EU Circular Economy would also contribute to the targets set by the European Green Deal and to the achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

However, there are major challenges ahead of us which need to be addressed with a systems approach, which requires human and financial resources to be allocated, and throughout our own value chain. We strongly believe that a real Circular Economy can be created only by taking a systemic approach that would encourage economic, social and political players that today work in an independent and isolated way to handle complex challenges with a global approach.

Adopting a circular economy model to effectively manage the end-of-life of packaging is crucial. However, while major resources have been quickly put in place by policy and market forces to fix the plastics problem hardly any attention is paid to support existing alternative packaging materials like glass which have proven to be circular already, with little resources being made available to optimize our already existing circular economy model.  The glass packaging value chain also needs investments in generalizing separate collection, improving sorting techniques, informing consumers.  It is also important not to destroy the existing and well-functioning bottle bank network by introducing competing systems like Deposit Refund Schemes for recycling.

Call to action to Close the Glass Loop

 We call on policy makers to work arm in arm with our industry to ensure that future decisions improve the investment conditions, stimulate innovation and keep us competitive in Europe. We call on the European, National and Local authorities to concretely support the “Close the Glass Loop” platform in achieving its objectives which are totally aligned and functional to the achievement of the EC Circular Economy goals.

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28.01.2020, FEVE