Numerous EU member states have reservations about the Commission's push to harmonise EU packaging law through its proposal for a Packaging and Packaging Waste Regulation (PPWR). In a public session at the Environment Council meeting last week, the environment ministers of several member states, including Belgium, Italy, Austria, Greece, the Czech Republic and Croatia, questioned the decision to replace the current Directive (PPWD) with a Regulation. Italy's environment minister Gilberto Pichetto Fratin criticised "prescribing methods and solutions without any kind of differentiation to the sorting of waste and recycling of waste". His was one of many calls to provide member states "room for manoeuvre" or flexibility on the path toward shared targets.
Austria's Leonore Gewessler was among the environment ministers who raised concerns about the impact of the legal form on established extended producer responsibility (EPR) or deposit return systems (DRS) for bottles and containers implemented under previous legislation such as the Waste Framework Directive (WFD) and the Single-Use Plastics Directive (SUPD). The proposed Packaging Regulation would interfere with national measures that are already up and running and therefore remove legal certainty, she said, referring among other things to her country's waste prevention efforts.
The Belgian minister Zakia Khattabi said the choice of a Regulation as the legal instrument was "not appropriate", adding that "this wish for harmonisation on all points will lead to the creation of an inefficient system" which failed to take into account national and cultural specificities and investments. Moreover, it would curb front runner states....
