Published: 22 Oct 2007
- Waste management strategies must be customised
to individual national conditions if they
are to prove effective, according to a new
EEA brochure released today. The brochure,
'The road from landfilling to recycling:
common destination, different routes' is
accompanied by a set of online national
factsheets on waste management covering
the EU-25.
'Although the overall objectives of our
waste legislation are determined at EU-level,
the onus is on Member States, not the EU,
to make the right strategic choices for
an effective outcome', says Jane Feehan,
Project Manager for Environmental Policy
Analysis at the EEA.
Shedding light on this, the EEA and its
Topic Centre have developed a set of country
factsheets containing information about
national waste management within the EU-25.
The fact sheets provide insights about:
national legislative frameworks on waste
types of policy instruments being used
data on waste
policies for reducing waste generation
and shifting waste management away from
landfill
The factsheets show that three groupings
of countries exist with similar systems
and levels of recycling, incineration and
landfill in Europe (see below). Success
criteria for diverting waste from landfill
seem to be combinations of landfill bans,
landfill taxes and separate collection schemes
in those countries with high material recovery
and incineration with energy recovery.
Three country groupings defined by waste
diversion strategy
EU-level waste legislation is instrumental
in determining the overall objectives, but
country-level implementation determines
the waste management strategy. To gain insights
into whether a strategic shift in broader
waste management has occurred, and why,
the EEA is currently analysing the approaches
and combinations of policy instruments that
countries are taking in the management of
their municipal waste, particularly in the
context of the Landfill Directive.
